The Deep Dive: How We Got Here

We’re so glad you have found our website and are here reading our blog! Before reading this deeper dive into our background, you might start with our quick story and blog intro.

Today, we consider ourselves happy, plantful vegans. We’re no magical unicorns, so be encouraged if you’ve ever thought I could never go vegan or if you don't yet know what "plantful" even means! We said the exact same thing, believe me. In fact, vegan was never a word we had used or possibly even heard of until our 30s.

Back in 2021, we realized we had a (gasp!) vegan friend. He politely refused a meal with us at Chick-fil-A (how could he?!) and we wondered what on earth he ate, let alone how he stayed full. Fast forward to that summer, when we had a toddler and a newborn, and I (Heather) was recovering from pre-eclampsia that showed up out of the blue 2 weeks before my due date. My blood pressure was still very high postpartum, even on medication, and the knowledge that I had a history of high cholesterol and triglycerides had me super concerned about having a stroke or a heart attack, even though I was in my mid-thirties. I kept hearing about 30-somethings suffering (or dying from) strokes and heart attacks and could not stop thinking about my health, especially as young as I was and with young children at home. I was also a good 50 pounds overweight, and had felt unable to shift my weight even with fairly consistent exercise. Some older friends had recently gone plant-based due to concerns with their own heart health, and referred us to the work of Dr. Caldwell B. Esselstyn. I ended up finding The End of Heart Disease by Dr. Joel Furhman in my Amazon searches and read it cover to cover; shortly thereafter we did a 6 week program of eating a nutritarian diet. My cholesterol and triglyceride numbers did an impressive nosedive, but I didn’t have a long-term plan in place to continue this lifestyle

The thought of trying something as seemingly “extreme” as plant-based eating seemed wild to both of us. The first time John and I talked about it, he absolutely balked at the thought of not eating meat (I, however, have a propensity to getting very excited about trying “crazy” things). Somehow, we came to terms with it only being a 6 week trial, and thought hey, we can do that! I tested my blood lipid levels before and after the 6 weeks, and was amazed by the progress I’d made. I remember us eating huge, delicious meals that kept us full for hours and we’d look at each other and say, “How could we ever go back to eating what we did before?! This food is amazing!”

And yet, we didn’t have a great plan in place for how to stay the course to continue seeing our lipid panels change, our heart health improve, and our weight decrease. The nutritarian approach, though excellent, is a bit more hard-core, and can be a big leap for someone coming straight from a Standard American Diet (appropriately shortened to SAD). Being plant-based doesn’t have to be quite as intense and rigid, and can definitely include some convenience foods as well as a heck of a lot of repetition if that makes life easier for you! More on this to come in future posts.

I reverted to eating some meat, mainly when we were out of the house, but John went meat-free soon after that summer. We both continued eating dairy, and our numbers crept back up, though perhaps not as high as before. Though we exercised regularly, we struggled with our weight. We had begun to shift our diet very slowly, and we continued reading books by Drs. Fuhrman and Greger. What we read made sense in our heads, but committing to a total change in our lifestyle felt hard. What would we do about eating out and socializing? How would we travel? Would our kids also have to commit to this? Toddlers are picky enough already; would they get enough to eat and meet their protein requirements? We had a lot of questions, and weren’t sure how to move forward when day to day life with two kids and living in a city felt like a lot of work already. (Not to mention that we had 24” of usable counter space to prep food. I wish I was kidding.)

We officially went plant-based as a family in mid-2024, and taking the leap together led to some incredible growth: a combined weight loss of 60+ pounds, cholesterol continuing to decrease, and an incredible amount of energy that has driven us to running 10Ks with ease (John) and weight lifting with confidence (Heather). We’ve also begun to really approach our food choices from an ethical standpoint as well, choosing the plantful life over our previous habits because it means we get to let animals live and better protect our world from the harmful effects industrialized animal agriculture has on the environment. 

The moral of the story is that change can take a while, and that’s ok. If you’re here because you’re plant-curious or because a doctor (or more likely your insistent vegan 35 year old child) is pestering you about your health, welcome! Changing your habits to being plant-rich can take a little while, but the point is that you’re staying curious and seeking out resources. Our entire goal with this website is to provide a spot for you to connect with helpful resources, whether other blogs, books, podcast episodes, or Youtube videos, that will help make your transition to a plant-based lifestyle easier. In a nutshell, this website is what we wish we’d had when we were first introduced to plant-based eating in 2021.

If you’re still reading, we’d love for you to subscribe to our newsletter, where we’ll send you a very short weekly to biweekly email sharing links to a recipe (or two) we love, an inspiring article, and to our latest blog post. We’ll gradually be adding merchandise to our shop, too, so that you can tell others about the joy of living a plantful life with stickers, totes, and more. You’ll also get a freebie for signing up: a guide to shopping for plant-based items at Walmart and Aldi. Plant-based eating doesn’t have to be expensive!

Join us as we dive into the world of plantful living. We’re so glad you’re here!

Peace, love, and plants,

John & Heather