What Happens When You Stop Eating Meat?

It is a bit difficult to eliminate meat from the diet, but it isn’t impossible. It has a lot of benefits including weight loss, reduction in body’s inflammation, protection of heart, promotion of friendly gut bacteria and many more.
Read further to know what happens when you stop eating meat.

What Happens When You Stop Eating Meat

1. Glowing Skin

• Taking a lot of nutritious vegetables and fruits helps you make your skin healthy and glowing. The vitamins in fruits and vegetables combat the common cause of skin blemishes i.e., free radicals present in the body.
• Foods rich in antioxidants include berries, cherries, plums, citrus, raisins, prunes, and olives.

2. Lose Weight

• According to Dr. Neal Barnard at George Washington University, the average person adopting plant based-diets loses about 10 pounds in the period of about 44 weeks. He says,
• “The take-home message is that a plant-based diet can help you lose weight without counting calories and without ramping up your exercise routine”.

3. Boosting Beneficial Gut Bacteria

• The fiber present in plant foods boosts the growth of beneficial bacteria in our guts. While meat which is poor in fiber can promote the growth of disease-promoting bacteria.
• Landmark studies have proven that when omnivores eat choline or carnitine which is found in meat, gut bacteria make a substance that is converted by our liver to a toxic product called TMAO. TMAO worsens cholesterol plaques in our blood vessels and increases the risk of heart attack and stroke.
• In contrast, people who eat plant-based diets make little or no TMAO.

4. Protects Heart

• Studies have shown that when people eliminate meat from their diets, their blood cholesterol levels drop up to 35%, which lowers the risk of heart disease, obesity, and also lowers high blood pressure.
• Plant-based diets reduce blood cholesterol levels because they are very low in saturated fat, high in fiber and contain zero cholesterol. Reducing blood cholesterol levels ultimately leads to the low risk of cardiovascular disease and stroke.

[ Read: What Happens When You Stop Eating Sugar ]

5. Reduce Inflammation in Your Body

• Taking meat, cheese, and highly processed foods elevate the levels of inflammation in your body. While plant-based diets are anti-inflammatory due to the high content of fiber, antioxidants, and other phytonutrients in them. These are much lower in inflammatory triggers.
• Studies have proven that people who depend on the plant-based diet can lower their level of C-reactive protein (CRP) which is an indicator of inflammation in the body.

6. Reduce Your Chances of Getting Type 2 Diabetes

• Animal fat, nitrates present in meat, and animal-based (heme) iron have been found to impair pancreatic cells, worsen inflammation, increase body weight, and impair the functions of our insulin.
• Health Professionals Follow-up Study and Nurses Health Study found that increasing red meat intake by more than just ½ a serving per day caused 48% increased risk of diabetes over 4 years.
• Taking plant-based diets daily can improve or even reverse one’s diabetes if one is already been diagnosed.

7. You May Lose Proteins like Vitamin B12

• You may lose calcium, iron, and vitamin B12 in the process of becoming a meat-free eater.
• Vitamin B12 can be derived from yeast and cereals while protein can be taken from eggs, cheese, black beans, lentils, and tofu.

8. You May Lose Your Sense of Taste

• People who eliminate meat from their diet suffer a common problem i.e., zinc deficiency. In addition to this, vegetarian foods are rich in phytic acid which interferes with zinc absorption.
• This zinc deficiency leads to the loss of taste buds which means you may lose your sense of taste.

9. Less Acidic

• To stay healthy, we need to have balanced pH levels in our body, but much of the modern diet today is comprised of acid-forming foods including red meat. A diet of meat, dairy, fast food, excessive sugar, and alcohol can increase the acidity in our body.
• “Red meat together with white flour, coffee, and soda produces a high acidic load for the body to absorb and neutralize,” says Dr. Warren.

People who start changing their dietary habits to a meatless lifestyle experience some temporary bloating. Also, a vegetarian diet may require the use of certain supplements to compensate the required amount of nutrients that might be lost in this transition. So, stop eating meat and start taking a plant-based diet to stay healthy and fit.

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