TL;DR: Gluten-free veganism is a boss battle for life and I am not here for it.

Remember how I said I was going vegan? And how too many internet resources were about the crying animals and all I wanted was health information?

It took me about a week to learn why I couldn’t find information for vegans choosing that diet for health reasons: because it’s actually a terrible diet for your health.

I should have written this post a while back, but I kinda… forgot about it. Whoops.

Don’t get me wrong, vegans can be healthy. Just not without MAJOR homework, at least one (usually more) supplements, specially fortified foods, and, if you’re serious about it, blood work??

Deficiencies that can happen when you’re a vegan and not super diligent: vitamin B12, calcium, iron, vitamin D, omega-3s, zinc. Potential results: bone weakness/osteoporosis, amnesia, blindness?!, muscle weakness, pregnancy and breastfeeding complications, impaired growth in children, and more.

To be fair, as the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition points out, vegetarians and vegans can have “higher content of fiber, folic acid, vitamins C and E, potassium, magnesium, and many phytochemicals,” and “vegan diets tend to contain less saturated fat and cholesterol and more dietary fiber.” Blood pressure, cholesterol, and heart health can benefited by vegan diets — but, based on my general research, similar results can be found by just cutting way back on meat.

It’s not that we shouldn’t eat animal products at all; the problem is that Americans eat way too much of them — and not in the healthiest ways, either. I doubt anyone will argue the fact that bacon is worse for your health than a (cooked, not fried) lean pork tenderloin.

My foray into veganism was further complicated by my gluten-free diet. I didn’t realize just how many vegan foods and snacks depend on pasta, bread, crackers, and other gluten-y staples. A lot of these things are available in gluten-free alternatives now, but those tend to cost at least four or five times more than the wheat-based versions, so I just can’t afford or justify buying them.

If I had more money and the time to make all my own snacks, who knows. Maybe I’d be a successful vegan. But I have a day job and disabilities and housekeeping and errands. Making my own flaxseed crackers isn’t on the schedule.

You can do the research for yourself. I do still think the environmentalist and humanitarian arguments for ethical production and consumption of animal products — which realistically would require us all to eat a lot less of them — are strong. But the health reasons? Not enough for me. Especially after I nearly passed out only a week in to my experience.