Restricting your diet to only meat sounds like a stupid idea. It goes against all conventional wisdom about healthy eating. Vegetables and fruit are endlessly promoted as essential to our well-being. But there are people who claim to have solved severe health problems by adopting a carnivore diet.
Ailments included digestive conditions, skin problems, allergies, arthritis, and also depression and anxiety have been alleviated, according to carnivore diet enthusiasts.
Mikhaila Peterson is proponent of an all-meat regime. She had been taking antidepressants since the age of eleven and also suffered from severe arthritis requiring joint replacement surgery.
Mikhaila had to leave university due to worsening depression that left her exhausted sleeping most of the day.
When she started on what she calls this "insane" meat-only diet, her depression started to lift. She came off a long list of medications and remembers starting to feel happy for the first time in her life.
Reading these stories made me curious to try the diet for myself and I ended up being a carnivore for about ten months. I wasn't depressed or suffering from any particular illness, but I did notice some surprising benefits:
- No body odour. It seems that what we usually smell of is plant residues.
- No bloated feelings after meals and your abdomen becomes flatter.
- No feeling hungry between meals. This diet makes eating two meals a day very easy.
- Simple menus. Time and energy spent on buying and preparing food is much less.
- You lose weight and gain muscle definition
- Better skin
There were also some drawbacks
- Cost, particularly in Thailand. Good quality meat is expensive here.
- Eating out is awkward. Your options become steak or steak. And watching other people eating their dessert is no fun!
- Boredom. Just eating meat can become a bit monotonous.
Overall it was a useful experiment. Gradually returning to a more orthodox diet highlighted several foods that I'd been sensitive to without knowing.
An all meat regime isn't a miracle cure and won't suit everyone.
However, the experience of carnivores shows that for some, meat-eating can have immense benefits.