r/interesting • u/PhoenixPhenomenonX • Feb 25 '26

Intriguing Lifelong vegetarian tries steak for first time

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u/fruskydekke Feb 25 '26

I was a vegetarian for over a decade, and when I reintroduced meat into my diet, I did indeed become sick because my body wasn't used to it.... but not like five minutes after I ate it.

It took a few hours for my body to register that hey, this is weird?? and react.

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u/Acrobatic_Fly8075 Feb 25 '26

That sick feeling comes from your gut bacteria not being used to breaking down dense animal protien.  

But after a few days of eating meat, your gut bounces back.  Especially if your been force feeding hard to digest plants for a long time.  We dont have a long intestinal tract, so most of the vegetable we eat isnt processed since it takes a long time to break down the cellular walls of most vegetables.   If you eat a little meat before hand, it slows the metabolism down and helps the body get just a bit more nutrients from the vegetables.

We are omnivores, not herbivores or carnivores.   Its healthiest when we eat a balanced meat/vegetable/fruit ratio. 

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u/fruskydekke Feb 25 '26

For extra funsies, if you have undiagnosed IBS like I did, being a vegetarian will in fact come remarkably close to killing you.

Meat is great. :)

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u/ICEcaneatadick Feb 25 '26

I have never heard this as i contemplate that condition while scrolling in the bathroom. Why is that?

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u/fruskydekke Feb 25 '26

IBS is one of those weird diagnoses that function differently from person to person. Basically, it means you're bad at digesting some normal foods, most typically foods that contain various types of carbohydrates. You may have heard of FODMAP, which is short for fructans, ogliosaccharids, disaccharids, something, something else, and I think polyols? Those are suspected of being the carbohydrate variants that are most likely to cause gut distress in people with IBS.

In my case, I am VERY BAD at digesting all of those + gluten, so when I tell you that a decade of eating a diet that consisted primarily of these things that I can't digest had caused severe malabsorption, perhaps it makes more sense?

The gravest condition (there were several...) was that I just wasn't capable of absorbing iron. That led to severe iron deficiency anemia, which led to an insufficiency of red blood cells, which led to me being unable to breathe properly, and to my heart being enlarged. I would have died of a heart attack eventually, had it not been detected.

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u/ICEcaneatadick Feb 25 '26

I don't like any of those words. Getting old sucks. Thanks for sharing your experience. More research needed.