What am I missing in my diet?

Jjjjjjjbarry

Hello,

I'm veggie and often feel weak or tired. I eat lots of stir fries with mixed veg, loads of quorn protein and steamed potatoes and broccoli etc. Have porridge for breakfast and cheese sandwiches for lunch etc but I don't take any supplements.

I've heard other veggies say before that they had to go back eating fish as they felt week and were lacking the fish oils. I tried a few health shops recently for some sort of veggie version of omega 3 but couldn't get anything.

Does anyone else have a similar problem and is there something that can easily be added to a diet to supplement what fish/meat eaters gain?

Zombienosh

Feeling with or tired could be a number of things, it could be how much you're eating? It could be an underlying health issue? or it could be a deficiency or some sort.

The best thing to do is go to the doctors and get some bloods done.

Just Like Heaven

Yeah go get bloods could be a number of things.

Perhaps iron, if you're deficient consider taking a supplement short term and concentrate on increasing the amount of iron source in your diet. Non haem iron isn't as easily absorbed, one of the best ways to improve this is include vitamin C with your sources of iron. For example I often include a lot of spinach in things like salad etc. and sometimes wash it down with orange juice.

As for fish oils you should look to include more omega3, vegetarians/vegans often add milled flaxseed to smoothies. I do this too but there are different types of omega3. ALA is found in stuff like flaxseed, but it's not as good as EPA and DHA (found in fish). Your body can convert AlA to the other types so that's why it's with upping your source if you need to, however it's not that efficient so taking a veg fish oil is handy. I take the opti3, they're made from algae. Can't link cause I'm on my phone just google it the best deal is to buy 3 for 2 straight from their site. My family who eat meat take them instead of their fish oils now cause the EPA/DHA dosage is pretty good!

On an anecdotal level, when I was a vegetarian I went back to taking fish oils myself because I would develop a click in my wrists. Didn't hurt or anything, I just didn't like hearing it every now and again, made me scared I was gonna have sore joints when I got older or something. The click would come and go within a week of me starting/stopping taking them periodically. The opti3s have the exact same effect though so I'm happy with them.

I was thinking of stopping taking them for a few weeks, to see if the click comes back, but wonder if it will because I also probably get a lot more omega3 from plant sources too now.

Anyway, that's not very.scientific just a ramble

It's likely to be an iron deficiency but go get a blood test, you might be low in B12/other things as well.

ch750536

As a recent vegan I kept a log of how I felt during the 'conversion'. I never felt tired but my wife felt tired before we converted. Turned out it was soya blocking some medication that she takes. The difference since we fixed this (kelp) is huge.

People lack energy regardless of diet if they don't take care to learn about what they are eating and what they should be eating. Even yesterday I learnt about calcium blockers.

veganate.blogspot.ie

--LOS--

It looks like you could be eating too many bad carbs, or just too many carbs, which would explain the energy. Don't rely on just quorn products for protein and don't just rely on potatoes, try other things like brown rice, quinoa etc. Cheese sandwiches wouldn't be the most energy inducing food to have for lunch, if you're going to be having sandwiches, make sure you have a good protein source on there, hoummous or something? You really need to eat protein with carbs, not just carbs alone. And I use opti 3 myself as well, you can get that online. Iherb is a good site for getting stuff like that cheaper too.

Jjjjjjjbarry

Thanks everyone. I'll order some opti 3 and see how I get on.

Will also get bloods checked if there's no improvement.
Started taking a multi vitamin also!

inocybe

If you're veggie not vegan you could try eating more eggs. I force myself to in an effort to boost protein, as I was very low in energy too though blood tests always show high iron levels.