Hi, my name is Colin and I have been a vegetarian for over 10 years due to personal reason. Prior to that, I tried it for 2 years but had to revert back to normal diet due to constant fatigue and low iron.

Besides vegetarian I am a bit of a gym fanatic as I have been weight training since the age of 16. 

When I first started on becoming a vegetarian. I had little knowledge, both in term of nutrition and cooking as I was spoilt having mum and dad (a chef) cook for me all my life until I moved out of home. Imagine a plate of meal with a portion of meat protein, potatoes and some greens, when becoming a vegetarian, I took out the meat protein so only consume potatoes and greens.

When I took the blood test, the general practitioner advised my iron was low and I should go back to have some fishes and red meats. The diet at the time also affect my weight training: there was no gain despite all the hard work in the gym so I went back to normal diet for a while.

An incidence occurred later that I decided to go back to being a vegetarian, this time, no matter what happens, I was determined to stick to my decision. I started to read, research, taking interest in cooking and seeing nutritionist about my issue.

Socialising with friends was hard and also eating out can be an issue in certain places, you need to know where to look so I eat mostly at home and was forced to learn about the different options available.

As things progress, I think it is a lot easier nowadays in certain places in the world being an vegetarian. I now train almost every day of the week and sometimes twice a day if I swim as well and I no longer feel I’m being disadvantaged because of my diet choice.