I have been a vegetarian for a year. In December of 2024, I lay awake in a hotel room with a terrible cluster headache in my right eye. We had completed a wonderful and full day celebrating our son’s birthday at a waterpark, and everyone was in deep sleep around me while I was in a sort of agony that I had begun to experience more and more often. Finally, I woke my husband, and he ran out into the sleeting rain to get some medication from our car. It was then that I told him I needed to make some type of lifestyle change, that I could not keep trying to maintain our active lifestyle with migraines and cluster headaches rendering me virtually useless: holed up in our bedroom with the curtains drawn while he took over the care for our two- and five-year-old. I decided to try out vegetarianism, hoping this change in diet would lead to the change I hoped to see in my life.
For me, becoming a vegetarian helped to mitigate my headaches, and I had a much healthier-feeling 2025 than 2024. I would also like to think that my change in perspective about diet has led to my kids being healthier in their nutrition, and whether that is true or not, it cannot be denied that they are around a much greater variety of vegetables and fruits than they had been before (however repulsive they may find some of the veggies!). I pledged to follow a vegetarian diet for a year to give the change a chance to truly alter my health. Now, I cannot imagine ever going away from being a vegetarian, but I also acknowledge that everyone has their own nutritional needs, and I did not transition my family to vegetarianism, just more veggie-forward meals while I myself omitted all meats. That said, my husband has been wonderfully supportive and an active participant in my journey, which I appreciate so much, since not all the taste-testing has been 100% enjoyable, especially at the beginning of the year.
Reflection number one
My food is so much more colorful as a vegetarian. I had heard about trying to “eat the rainbow” and the variety of vitamins and minerals from foods of different shades. Now, throughout the week, my family would see oranges from butternut squashes, carrots and cantaloupes (some grown in our own garden), sweet potatoes, mandarins, peaches, and mangoes. The greens were exuberant: dark-hued kale and arugula, crisp asparagus from the border of our woods, bright lettuce, pears, grapes, sugar snap peas, and enough basil that we gave it away by the grocery bag. Red from berries, pomegranates, and radishes, yellow from sweet corn, spaghetti squash, and those wonderful small potatoes from Aldi, blue from berries, the pink of watermelon, and the list goes on and on. Being a vegetarian, I just really started paying attention while plating meals, noticing what colors were represented, and I would say that as the year progressed, I put together more and more wonderfully colorful plates for me and my family.
Reflection number two
I think one of the main reasons the diet change made such an impact on my health is that, when I made the transition, I basically had to commit to a year without fast food and a year without meat. There are very few options at fast food restaurants for vegetarian or veggie-forward diets, although there are more now than ever before with the introduction of non-meat products. I had to be much more cognizant about packing snacks and filling meals because I could not depend on “just grabbing something” if I was hungry. My tastes changed as well. For a while, I longed for cheeseburgers or fun food like pizza. Then, I started longing for my rainbow plates of food rather than food to be eaten out of a bag. I started noticing just how much better I felt. After that breakthrough, the cravings were much easier to ignore, and I would say now, a year later, I don’t even spare a thought for those types of food.
Final reflections
I have learned so much during my year as a vegetarian. I have an entire repertoire of vegetables and dishes that I love to make and eat. I have a new appreciation for eggs. I have become the person who brings salads and non-meat protein dishes for holiday get-togethers. My husband and I have fallen even more in love with the Westside as we have found some absolutely wonderful chapati and Indian restaurants, two types of food that have perfected dishes without meat (and contributed to our devotion to cauliflower in its many forms!). I have learned to read cookbooks and make alterations based on on-hand materials and meal prep, and have grown to be proud of myself in the kitchen. It has been delightful to see our kids’ curiosity with new foods, and their palate grow: one will now ask for chickpeas, and the other will eat a head of broccoli; both delight in working in our garden and harvesting the fruits and veggies, are willing to try most things, and ask for fruit when they are hungry.
Vegetarianism has helped me to feel better. I had notably fewer headaches in the past year than the one preceding. I am more health conscious than I was before. I lost eight pounds in the first six months, which I am sure helped me to feel better as well. Overall, I just feel good. I am proud of myself for sticking to the diet, for introducing so many healthy foods into my family’s diet. If there was any advice I would give about transitioning to a vegetarian diet, it would be to give yourself grace, to begin just by being veggie-forward, and to put the focus on the variety of items that ARE on your plate rather than what is NOT on your plate. I am optimistic that I will continue to feel well in 2026 as we keep eating the rainbow.
