How to balance between being intuitive and making myself eat protein?

So I pay to use this lady’s meal plan service but I thought it would be ok if I shared this one recipe. If anyone prefer I take it down I completely understand.

It’s delicious though!

Just got more bloodwork. It's been about 4 months of the heme iron supplement, and trying to hit 1900-2100 cal/day and 100-1120g protein. Overall, been very successful at that, even though a lot of that comes from plant based protein powder/soy/dairy/eggs.

My ferritin went up 8 points, so now it's 24. I thought it would be higher, but I'll take it! So I guess I need the supplement still. I am seeing some hair regrowth, feeling generally more energetic. Blood pressure still very low, but it hasn't crashed (in the past, it's gone below 90/60 several times, too dizzy to drive, had to eat salt and lie down with legs elevated) for the past 2 months.

My white blood cells, which were low last time (3.7) are now 3.6. I don't know what that means, doctor will comment probably by Wednesday or so. She wasn't concerned before, so hopefully she won't be concerned now? My MCH is also slightly high, which can be related to B vitamin deficiencies, argh. I've been taking the recommended multivitamin that has those. We shall see what she says.

I will follow up with the dietician as well. She might want me to eat more meat than I currently am (I do grass fed ground beef tacos from the place up the street about 1x/wk, and tuna and sometimes chicken when I can stand it). I have also found an organic grass fed beef jerky that I like. Protein, iron, and salt, all of which I need. I am still having trouble making myself eat any form of meat, poultry, or fish. I still can't bring myself to cook it. Any tips?

For me, I choose plant protein powder (pea protein isolate) because the grocery store brand I buy is cheap, tastes amazing, and my muscles like it. I switched to grass fed whey for awhile. It cost more, tasted worse, and didn’t make any difference in performance, so I’m back to Hy-Vee Energy Edge plant protein. I love the stevia/monk fruit sweetener. Stevia alone has a bitter aftertaste. I switched to Designer Whey awhile back because it was whey with similar sweeteners, but it didn’t taste nearly as good as my grocery store protein powder.

I toodled on over to this thread out of interest and find the conversation enjoyable. I realized that unless I click on "follow post" I don't receive notifications so I missed some interesting tidbits.

Out of curiosity are there are reasons why you might choose plant protein powder over whey? I've tried egg white protein powder and plant-based protein powder, and I'm not sure if it's a brand thing but I couldn't stand the taste of either one. I don't seem to have any gut or digestive issues with whey and I prefer the taste so I was curious to know about the preferences.

The same cannot be said about my gut/digestive issues and certain sugar-free items. I accidentally bought sugar free hard candies and peppermints last week and I'm sure I ate more than my fair share the other night, because my stomach kept waking me up. I thought it was just a fluke until it dawned on me over the following days that it might have something to do with the sugar alcohols (since I basically consume them on an evening-basis).

That last paragraph had nothing to do with protein...🤦‍♀️

I don't eat a lot of meat, winter is kind of an outlier since we had turkey on Thanksgiving and ham at Christmas. But otherwise maybe fish or eggs once a week. Meatballs occasionally or a hamburger out. I like plant based burgers (like a bean or garden burger), but if given the option between a fake meat burger (like Impossible) or beef burger I'll take the beef. Everyone is different, I think some can be perfectly healthy eating vegan or vegetarian as long as you're getting enough calories. You have to find what's right for you and it may take awhile.

If you want to add more meat to your diet but don't want to cook it from raw, start with already cooked options that you just need to heat up. If you have a Trader Joe's near you they have a lot of prepared foods like this that seem relatively healthy.

For me, when coming off of the vegan years and the associated health issues, I started eating one organic skinless chicken breast and one serving of grass fed ground beef per week. I also had fish a couple times a month. This while keeping plant intake quite high, taking fish oil, and including some eggs and cheese. The majority of my meals do not include meat. I use plant protein powder, throw tofu in my smoothies, drink soy milk, and love peanut butter. I eat beans and lentils several times per week. Those initial changes dramatically improved my health.

Now, as I'm deliberately increasing muscle mass and strength, all of the above still applies, but I include some kind of meat or fish at lunch most days. Breakfast and dinner are vegan or vegetarian basically every day. On days when I don't eat meat or fish for lunch, I'll have something like bean soup, scrambled eggs, a plant protein shake, or cheese pizza. Still keeping fruit and veggie, nut and seed, grain, bean, and sweet potato intake up there.

I consider chocolate covered almonds an important food group. 😃 I don't deny myself any foods. If I have that foundation of good nutrition, I'm able to eat whatever else I want without any rules or fears.

Those of you who eat meat, how often do you eat it? Of course I will also ask the dietitian about this, but I would like to rely on meat as only as much as I need to for my health and bloodwork to normalize and stay that way. I am sure "normal" varies widely, but I think I need some examples of how it can be done? I would prefer to be plant-based as much as I can.

Good to read the update and glad things are going well! If I had to add meat to my diet I'd go for a carne asada taco or nachos with carne asada on top. Or pasta with Italian beef meatballs. Agree with skwigg it all about how it's seasoned and cooked.

It sounds like things are going pretty well. Very cool that your appetite and weight are adjusting. How are you feeling in terms of energy?

With chicken and ham, and I guess any food, tofu, LOL, it really matters how it’s seasoned and prepared. I’ve had some terrible, dry chicken and some absurdly salty and tough ham, but when it’s good, it’s very good. I agree, you can’t go wrong with fried chicken and grass-fed beef. 😃

Another update: I have been following the new dietitians's plan (more calories, more fat, more protein, basically) for about a month, and it's been interesting. At first, I was too full, never hungry, and had to force myself to eat the meals and snacks, and was often bloated and uncomfortable. About a week later, I found myself actually getting hungry!

Over the holidays, I was not in my vegetarian household (husband has always been vegetarian) and so had multiple opportunities to try meat, so I did. Before that, I had only tried canned tuna and salmon, for the no-cooking aspect, and to hopefully boost my protein and healthy fat. Didn't like it at all, but became tolerable after awhile. Still don't love it, but can eat it.

I tried ham (tasted so weird and strong and not what I remember!) and chicken (in a Chinese takeout dish, sauteed) and did NOT like it, super strong taste! Pre-vegetarianism, I liked chicken and ham; very odd. Upon returning home, my friend convinced me to get a fried chicken taco with her, and that I did like, probably because it's deep fried, haha.

Today (funnily enough, on the way home from my cardiology appointment), I got a grassfed ground beef/scrambled egg/cheese taco with plentiful salsa, and I was surprised how much I liked it. Just what the cardiologist ordered, lol. It is extrememly odd that beef, which I was never super into in my pre-vegetarian days, is the most tolerable. My body must reallllly want the iron. The cardiologist basically said to eat more salt, and maybe get a burger now and then to get my iron up. I have more tests, but unlikely to find anything. She said, "All day, I tell people to eat less salt and more vegetables. It's the opposite for you." Ha!

Also, my weight has pretty much been stable, which I didn't expect. I'm sure the bloating at the beginning took me up a few pounds, but I didn't check because I decided oh well if that's what it takes to fix my bloodwork and not feel like I need to take a nap all the time. They weighed me today at the doctor's office and it's right in my normal range (I seem to have a 5 lb. range of normal depending on my cycle/hydration etc.) So that was interesting, too.

Thanks, @skwigg and @sarahtoo! I am looking forward to feeling better. I had no idea I should be eating that much!

I've heard that protein needs will take care of themselves as long as you're eating enough (and not actively avoiding protein). So it makes sense that you haven't been meeting your calorie needs. Anything below 2000 sounds low to me unless really petite or sedentary. Good luck! I hope you can find foods you enjoy that help get you back to health.

Yes, that seems like a conservative calorie recommendation. Perfect for a small, reasonably active person. If you were doing more intense or longer duration workouts, that wouldn’t be enough food. It’s a good starting point. Once you get the health issues resolved, you’ll be better able to judge portions based on how you’re feeling. It won’t always be a math problem, or feel like you’re ignoring fullness. Your body will put the additional food to good use as your metabolism wakes up.

That sounds like a solid strategy from the new dietitian. What I have learned from years of underfeeding and overexercising myself is that there is a colossal health and quality-of-life difference between maintaining a weight in an exhausted semi-starved state, and maintaining the same weight with plenty of food, adequate rest, and a healthy metabolism. It's like night and day. So, I was just nodding along with what you have written. I was also chuckling at the dietitan telling you to use my exact strategies - drink milk with protein and fat (almond milk is just water), put cheese on everything, add (a lot of) peanut butter to your oats and shakes, full fat Greek yogurt is yummy. Some other ones I like are: putting avocado in smoothies, adding avocado to sandwiches or toast, or making guacamole and eating it on crackers or tortilla chips. I also drain and freeze chunks of extra-firm tofu and put a cube or two in my protein shakes or smoothies. I eat lots of nuts. I've been getting this macadamia, pistachio, almond, pecan mix from Aldi that is so good.

I feel like grass-fed ground beef was some kind of miracle cure when I was coming off of lower fat vegan eating. I only eat a small serving once a week or so, but it made a big difference in my energy level and wellbeing. Salmon helped a lot too as a quality protein with good fat.

I hope the shift in your eating style and the new iron supplement have you feeling better quickly. It sucks to be tired and have your hair fall out. That low blood pressure feeling is awful too. In the past, I've had to deliberately put salt on things or eat some canned/processed food in order to avoid that. Good luck with the changes you're making. Let us know how it goes.

***This post contains some numbers (calories and scale), in case anyone wants to avoid. I am not sure if numbers are allowed, so apologies in advance if that's a rule. Also, this might get long.

Update: ended up with a new dietitian because the other one is now on maternity leave. I think I like this one even better, as she is much more organized. She said basically the same thing as the other one: I have been eating mostly vegetables and starch for 17 years, and it's not cutting it now that I'm in my 40s. I need protein and fat and iron. I have lost about 1/3 of my hair :( Also, my blood pressure is crazy low, and sometimes has gone below what is considered safe (90/60 is the lowest of the low) and I feel awful when that happens (lightheaded, dizzy, can't drive, can't stand up etc.)

The other dietitian told me to stop the iron supplement that didn't raise my ferritin: I took SlowFe, and it rasied my storage, but my ferritin stayed the same after 4 months, meaning that I had iron, and my body was unable to convert it to usable form. That was August. From August-Nov, I took a prenatal vitamin with iron. My iron stores dropped by 1/3, and my ferritin stayed the same. Boooooo. Lab-made iron isn't working. My body doesn't know what to do with it.

Now I'm on a heme iron supplement that is made from beef. I am now taking it 3x/day, which is the target. Papaya enzymes have helped SO MUCH as far as being able to tolerate it digestively. Yay. We'll see what happens 3-4 months from now; started that at the beginning of December.

Anyway, back to new dietitian: they are both in agreement that I am not eating enough protein or calories, and this one says I also need more fat. The calorie part seems crazy to me, because I am a normal weight for my height, slightly below the middle of the range of what is considered "healthy." I am not super active. But they both said that 20 min. yoga + 10-20 min. of weights/bodyweight circuit + 20-30 min. of walking and then hiking or yardwork on weekends is more active that I think it is. Plus I am on my feet a lot at work, but it's not like I'm working construction or stocking a warehouse or something. Also, I'm short, only 5'3". But they both say I've been undereating for over a decade, which is surprising to me.

She said I need 1900-2100 per day, roughly, which seems insane. It's been a long time since I've done calorie math, but yeah, on average I'm lower than that, 1600-1700 usually, and I'm usually 113-118 lbs. The idea that I can maintain on higher calories seems odd. She said I might gain a bit initially, but it would level off and go back down as my metabolism adjusts? IDK how that works. Does this seem plausible? I am going to try the suggestions on the plan she wrote up, and see what happens. My vegetarian intuitive eating isn't working.

The previous dietitian said to aim for 70g of protein, and suggested adding an egg and a Greek yogurt daily, but other than that didn't give me much in terms of ideas. This one says more like 110g of protein daily since I am coming from a place of deficiency and we want my hair to grow back. So, I'm basically "reverse dieting," trying to add more calories, protein, and fat without making me feel overly full. It is hard, because I get too full easily, but eating smaller amounts more often seems to help.

Her main strategy is to take things that I already eat and like, and add protein and fat, like, adding a tablespoon of peanut butter to my oatmeal/protein powder combo, switch to Silk Protein milk instead of almond or soymilk, add cheese to veggie burgers, Greek yogurt to lentils, some of the same things that skwigg suggested, actually. If I can manage to get some fish/chicken/beef/whatever in there, great! But she said I'd likely have more initial success if I focus on making additions to things I eat already, and aim for complete proteins I like (eggs, dairy, protein powders with a complete amino acid profile, tofu/veggie burgers/tempeh, etc.

So, there's the update. Hoping to feel better as my iron increases and I become less protein deficient. Any thoughts/experiences appreciated!

It took me probably a year to fully recover from the two years of veering too far into low-fat vegan. I felt better pretty quickly, but growing new hair and fingernails takes a minute.

I can relate to the snack situation. It will be time to eat something with protein, I'm not hungry for it in the moment, but if I skip it, I find myself ravenous and low on energy later. I'm totally used to eating enough food and enough protein now. I look forward to those snacks when it was weird as hell at first. Eating adequately feels different from undereating, for sure, but it absolutely will feel normal and second nature in time.

I like tuna and salmon pouches much better than the cans. There is no oil or water to drain. If you want to go in a weird but delicious direction, try tuna, mayo, half a diced apple, and dried fruit (cherries, blueberries, or raisins) stirred together. I put peanut butter on the other half of the apple and eat it on the side. Anyone who has seen me eat the tuna/apple/mayo combo usually looks like they're going to throw up, but it's great! It's like chicken salad. Sliced grapes would be good in it too, maybe walnuts.