The article has been automatically translated into English by Google Translate from Russian and has not been edited.

Veganism, ice baths and rising in 5 in the morning: how I led a healthy lifestyle for a year and what came of it

'06.05.2021'

Source: Life hacker

Journalist and writer Decca Aitkenhead told Life hacker about his unusual experience and its results.

Photo: Shutterstock

At the beginning of 2017, I could not leave the bed. January has just begun, and I could not keep my New Year's promise to go to the gym again because of the strongest flu. I had to ask my friends to look after the children. When they arrived, I crawled to the front door. One glance at my pitiful figure, clinging to the radiator in the hallway, was enough for them to gently reproach me and advise me to take better care of my health.

I didn’t lead a completely harmful lifestyle, but I never really thought about health. By nature, I'm pretty lazy and love to eat. And until 40, health was maintained on its own. From time to time I went to the gym, monitored my weight and completely dispensed with a smoothie with spirulina and a discount card for health food stores. It never occurred to me that one day such an approach would stop working.

After a difficult course of chemotherapy in 2015, I gained extra weight, and only the name remained of my immune system. The flu was the last straw. Now is the time to take drastic measures. I needed help. I found a small company, Detox-Fit, that provides the services of a personal trainer and nutritionist. Only they offer not just healthy food, but exclusively veganism.

Previously, I did not think about the attitude towards animals. She loved to eat meat, and considered veganism an empty chatter. Then I asked myself: can I eat right without becoming a vegan? Why not just listen to your body? For most, this is a reasonable decision, but not for me. My body regularly requires two Mars bars and a chocolate bar for breakfast.

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The owners of Detox-Fit looked like a model of physical ideal, and I decided on a three-month experiment with a personal trainer and a vegan diet. Just in case, I took part in the challenge of Women's Health magazine and took my picture before the test. Such challenges have always seemed to me very effective.

Nothing motivates to stay away from the refrigerator, as the anticipation of the photograph “after”.

At the end of January 2017 of the year I began to engage with a trainer three to four times a week. Rory Lynn used to be a professional rugby player. He dispelled all my prejudices about personal trainers. Before, they always seemed to me just a symbol of lifestyle.

I was never attracted to the thought of paying someone to shout at me in the gym. Therefore, I studied myself, almost 25 years doing the same exercises. They were not particularly different from what most visitors to any gym do: several approaches on weight training machines, a treadmill and some kind of jerking in the air in the manner of Jane Fonda. It never crossed my mind that all this is almost a waste of time.

There was nothing like this in training with Rory. I plunged into a new unfamiliar world: a bear walk and a burp, Turkish lifts and Russian twisting, a gluteal bridge on one leg and a gait of a crab. Something was like the movements of everyday life: climbing the platform, throwing a stuffed ball on a mat, walking back and forth with a heavy load.

When Rory demonstrated these exercises, they seemed simple and even funny. But when I started doing them, after a few minutes I was already lying on the floor trying to catch my breath. "When are we going to move on to simulators?" I asked plaintively. It turned out - never.

But this was not the main surprise. Practicing almost to nausea with Rory was much easier than hanging around the gym itself. By temperament, I am usually not inclined to transfer control to others. And for me it was a complete surprise how much easier it is for me to do when everything is decided for me. The difficulty, after all, is to force yourself to come to the gym, and then not escape from there in 20 minutes. Because of this, the whole workout you fight with yourself. But when you have a coach, you can just forget about it.

You come when the coach speaks and you do what he says. There is no need for willpower.

Other useful habits have somehow taken root imperceptibly for me. I began to get up at 5 in the morning and start the day with an 15-minute cold bath. This was advised to me by a friend who also had chemotherapy. It is believed that they improve the functioning of the immune system. The first time I screamed at the whole house. Soon I realized that I needed to get into an empty bath and gradually pour water. I would not call it a pleasant pastime, but the sensations after are comparable to taking Class A drugs. Sometimes the buzz remains until lunch.

Dry brush massage also makes you feel alive. It is useful for lymphatic drainage and elimination of toxins. Everything is very simple: within 10 minutes, massage the whole body with a dry brush, and after a few days you begin to glow.

Another surprise awaited me. Veganism does not complicate at all, but simplifies life. An omnivorous diet is an endless debate between your inner angel and demon. Everything you eat requires a decision. And so you need to make only one decision - do not eat animal products. Then you practically don’t think about food. Advertising calls to eat something harmful are no longer valid. Fast food can seduce you as much as you like, you will no longer succumb.

If you eat only plant foods, the likelihood of eating something very harmful is minimized.

Vegetables, seeds, legumes and fruits are becoming an integral part of nutrition. You no longer need to think how to shove them into your diet. Of course, you can overeat with popcorn or french fries. But such food, unlike fried chicken or cheesecake, is not created artificially in order to deceive your senses and force you to eat more and more. Therefore, there is not much harm from her.

It’s harder for vegans to go to cafes and restaurants. The Happy Cow application helps me. Almost anywhere in the world, it finds places with vegan cuisine. Even in the American town of Spokane, where Krispy Kreme donuts came first, Happy Cow found a fresh bar for me with vegan rice dishes. In Melbourne, I came across with him a stunning place called Lord of the Fries, which sells vegan "chicken" schnitzels and bacon burgers. And in London, she was able to satisfy the need for fast food in the Sanctuary restaurant. They have egg-free frit on the menu and an amazing french fries with tofu fish that tastes like cod.

Veganism did not cause me any trouble until my friends invited me to visit.

I did not want to embarrass them. I naively believed that it was enough to ask them not to prepare anything for me separately. It turned out that my fear of inconvenience was nothing compared to the owners' panic at the thought that their guest would eat only bread and lettuce. A delicious vegan dish was prepared for me. And although it was amazingly tasty, I felt awkward.

Before, I always thought: why don't vegans eat what they give away, and just go back to their diet the next day? But then I believed that they would secretly be happy to eat something harmful. It seemed to me that I would have felt in their place. Since compassion for animals did not lead me to veganism, I thought that I would not worry if I fell off and eat something meat.

But here one more surprise awaited me. When I look at meat now, I have no desire to eat it. And not at all because of the harm to my body, but because of the thought of what happened to it before it hit me on the plate.

As soon as you start thinking where the meat comes from, you realize that eating it is unacceptable.

Of course, the bacon sandwich still seems to me delicious. But it would be very convenient to keep a couple of slaves at home, but no one in their right mind would do it.

Three months later, I could no longer return to the old way of life. Rory and I extended the sports challenge until the end of the year. Over time, my only complaint about a healthy lifestyle was a tendency to complacency. My previous careless attitude to health has disappeared. I even started to enjoy the new lifestyle.

By the end of the year, I lost 18 kilograms, pumped up muscles that I didn’t even know existed, and for the first time in many years I again felt physically strong. Taking photos with the results for Women's Health magazine was a lot nicer. But the main change occurred when I reconciled with my new self. At first I was not comfortable confessing that I was a vegan, but now I like it.

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I like that I am no longer an accomplice to the horrors that underlie the modern Western diet. I like to take myself and the planet more seriously.

Now it only bothers me what it will lead to. Recently, friends from Los Angeles came to visit me. They always fanatically took care of their health and were quite critical of my diet. I wrote to them in advance that there would be gluten-free vegan cuisine for dinner, and asked if they still had any dietary preferences. Honestly, I wanted to impress them more. What other preferences may be besides “vegan” and “gluten-free”?

“Now we only eat foods that suit us by blood type,” my friends answered. When I laughed, I felt uneasy. Is it really waiting for me? If next year I will write about nutrition by type of blood, please someone order me bigmak.

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