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He's right, you have to eat healthy, and it's easy to not do so as a vegetarian. Pizza, pasta, bread, chips, cheese fries, cokes, french fries, and most junk food is vegetarian, and here's the biggest problem. When you're starving, if your main criteria is that you don't want meat, then it's easy to grab a bag of chips, or a veggie burger, fries, and large soda. You won't lose any weight that way. If you are doing it for ethical reasons, you'll probably be happier, but if it's primarily for health, you'll be frustrated.
So, my advice is to grab a comfort zone. Find a handful of recipes you love that are healthy. Healthy means whole grains, vegetables without added salt or sugar, beans without added fats... You know the stuff. The closer to the way it grows, the healthier it will be. Even so, you can find foods that are fattening, like avocados or nuts, but as long as you don't overdo those, they are still healthy. Also, don't take that to mean you can't ever eat a pizza again--you can eat less than perfect foods as part of a healthy diet. Just switch priorities--instead of junk mixed with a little health food now and then, eat healthy with occasional indulgences. How many just depends on how much and how fast you want to lose weight.
So, set up your basic healthy standby recipes, and make sure you have the ingredients to make them. Then build on your recipe base. Try out new stuff, keep what you like, change out standbys when you want. Just always have something you can make quick that will be healthy and will satisfy you, and that you eat when you can't think of what else to make. The healthier you make these standbys, the faster you'll get healthier.
Be sure to add a new recipe or two a month to your list, to fight off boredom. Boredom is the biggest diet killer, but there is so much out there you can try that you shouldn't get bored unless you just quit exploring. Yeah, once in a while you might grab a cheeseburger, feel bad about it for a few days, maybe even go on a meat binge for a couple of weeks. That's not bad, as long as you have your goals in mind. People who don't have those new recipes and that sense of adventure with new foods are the ones who give it up.
Try different ethnic foods. Ethiopian, Italian, Indian, anything you can think of-ian. Read websites like happycow.com if you run out of ideas. (There are others, that's just the cutest name, so I remember it more quickly). Buy some cookbooks, and read them for inspiration and for future recipes you want to try. Fight boredom, in other words, but have a fallback plan for those times you don't feel creative.
And come up with some favorites to cover all your cravings. Comfort food, protein gorge (fake meats or beans are good for that), pizza jones, light fare, heavy and unhealthy dessert. Don't keep your pantry and freezer full of junk to fill up on, but have things you can pick up when you are hungry.
And don't try to do it all at once. Weight loss, I mean. Don't count lost pounds, count the number of days you've eaten healthy. If you focus on the healthy eating (and exercise, too), and think of that as the goal, you won't get as frustrated when you plateau or when you lose weight more slowly than you want. The first couple of weeks you won't lose much--you might even gain a little as you reduce fat in your diet--but after that you will drop the bigger numbers, if you stick with it. Don't set your idea of success on weight loss, set it on how healthy you can eat, and then just smile when you do see the weight disappear. Make the journey more important than the goal, in other words, and make the journey a lifetime trip (and forgive yourself when you step off the path--everyone loves to eat bad now and then).
Okay, way more than I planned, but I'm too tired to edit. Get some books, maybe get some friends, and stick to it.
I'm reading a good book right now. It's called "The Engine 2 Diet," by Rip Esselstyn. He's a triathlete and firefighter here in Austin, and his father is a heart specialist who has also written books on heart disease and vegetarian diets. Rip is famous in Austin for helping train Lance Armstrong, and also for getting his whole fire department shift to go vegan, mostly because one of his co-workers was having serious problems. It focuses on the health side instead of the gory "How can you eat animals when they go through THIS!" side. Lots of good recipes, too. That, or any number of books people will recommend, is a good way to start.
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