The Reluctant Vegetarian - a dietry evolution

It all started in July 1989, the culmination of several, very stressful years. Di and I decided to call it quits in Perth; we sold everything we had; did a deal with our creditors and headed off to Darwin in an old Holden panel van we purchased for five grand.

Up to and including this time we ate, drank and smoked with great enthusiasm.

Di is, and has always been a great cook and I have always been a great eater (the perfect partnership). Proof of my exceptional ability in this area was my weight at the time (92 kilos).

We fitted right in, up in Darwin; we drank, we smoked, we ate meat and were soon on everyone’s party list. Of course we were health conscious and to appease our conscience we took up swimming every day. We had it all covered.

The bubble burst one fine Darwin day in late November, I arrived home to find Di being loaded into an Ambulance. Naturally I was very concerned and asked to speak to her. The door of the ambulance swung open and there’s Di, the toughest lady I know, crying and telling me she’s dying, her heart’s beating out of control and she’s really scared.

I followed the Ambulance to the hospital and after much confusion we found that she had suffered a severe anxiety attack and was on the verge of a breakdown. The stress of the last few years had finally surfaced. The doctors wanted to give her Valium. Not an idea she took too kindly to.

Over the next few weeks I lived with the shell of the lady I knew. Up until this point in our partnership she had been able to take all the ups and downs of our “on the edge” lifestyle in her stride and bounce back bigger and better than ever.
“This is a warning” says Di “ No way am I taking Valium, I’m giving up smoking and becoming a vegetarian”. In one of my more supportive moments I say  “Great, I’ll give you three months and if you’re still not smoking I’ll give up too”. Past history had convinced me I still had many more years fagging. Di’s previous effort at giving up lasted about fifteen hours.

The transition to vegetarian food was easy. Di is a very innovative cook and the food still tasted great. Many of the recipes have ended up in “The Twenty Minute Vegetarian”, a great little cook book Di put together after many requests from friends and dinner guests.

It turns out Di was a lot sicker than I thought. She actually managed to give up smoking even with me puffing away on ten or so fags over a couple of beers each night after work.

The three months went by “real quick”.

It was crunch time, could the mouth, (me) really give up smoking?

With the introduction of the new smoking laws in offices, I had stopped smoking during the day by this time because standing outside in the heat in Darwin to have a smoke was not my idea of fun. So the days were no problem, but the nights were murder. Every time I had a beer I wanted a smoke; every time I had a coffee I wanted a smoke; every time I ate I wanted a smoke. I figured the only way to beat this was to change all these habits.

1.  Go for a walk at night instead of having a beer.

2.  Stop drinking coffee

3.  Stop eating (well two out of three ain’t bad)

It worked! I had no problem from that point on and I figured I would have a drink at some time in the future when I felt like it. The most fascinating side effect of me giving up drinking was the reaction of my mates. They were very ‘pissed off’ and even suggested that I would be too boring to party with them. Interestingly enough, although they ragged me relentlessly, they grew to like the idea when it came to their shout.

So! I’m now a vegetarian and I don’t smoke, I don’t drink and I’ve given up coffee. What else is there? We all know what that is and I now have plenty of energy and time for that.

Surprisingly enough this was only the beginning of the dietary evolution.
I noticed over the next few years that I had become a lot more sensitive to my feelings (A regular New Age Sensitive Guy). I began to notice how much and what I ate affected how I felt. Initially we ate lots of sweet things. It was taking the place of all the things we had given up and was almost as addictive as the cigarettes. We felt we needed to have something sweet every night after dinner. We also ate lots of cheese, white pastry and pasta made from white flour.

On the positive side, I dropped back to 75 kilos over the next three years. We had plenty of energy and no hangovers (not a happy event in Darwin’s heat). Our friends even said we looked years younger. I think this was a result of the change in our complexions, particularly Di’s; it was radiant. Our eyes became so clear, the whites soooo white and over time our irises have also changed colour.

Over the years Di devoted a lot of time to studying nutrition and has made a lot of changes to our diet, particularly in relation to protein, vitamin and mineral requirements. As a result of this, we reduced our intake of sweet treats, cheese (the only dairy product we ate) and products containing white flour.

After eight years in Darwin the weather finally won and we decided to visit my daughters on the Gold Coast in Southern Queensland. Seven fantastic years have passed since then, my girls have moved on and we are still here enjoying the best climate and location in Australia.

My Story could have concluded at this point as we felt our diet was pretty fantastic, apart from my Hay Fever, we both felt great and life was pretty cruisey.

But the evolution continued.

We discovered a brochure, in the health shop we patronize, which promoted live blood analysis. The brochure stated that “Live Blood Analysis” could test for nutritional, vitamin and mineral deficiencies plus detect a number of other diseases and deficiencies.

I thought, what a great way to check to see whether our diet is working.

We were pleased to find the person taking our live blood was no Dracula, but a delightful guy named Erick Johnson who had studied and became an expert in his science to save his own life.

We were a little surprised at the results of our first tests, although our blood was in reasonable condition. Di was very low in minerals, she had some fungus in her blood and a viral infection in her blood known as Mycoplasma.  Despite the fact that we were already taking colloidal minerals I was also low in minerals. I had more fungus in my blood than Di and a heavier concentration of Mycoplasma than her. My blood cells were all stuck together in what looked like a stack of plates one behind the other. “This is not good”. I also had blood in my urine, which is also not good. The most interesting thing that came out of the day for me was the first thing Erick said when he looked at my blood. “You had cheese for lunch didn’t you” “Very smart” I thought, so I said “What Brand”? In actual fact I’d had Parmesan cheese on the salad I’d eaten for lunch. Erick proceeded to tell me that I was highly allergic to dairy products and that I should cut them out of my diet completely. I found it amazing that a piddly little bit of Parmesan would make that much difference.

Erick spent a lot of time explaining our results and how we could change our diet to rectify the deficiencies. He also explained what mycoplasma is and what an enormous effect it can have on our health. “Very enlightening”. (for more information search the word mycoplasma on the internet, there are many interesting articles).


On completion of the consultation Erick gave us a list of foods to eat or avoid . I asked him if there were any recipe books published that followed this nutritional advice. His answer, “Not to my knowledge”.

So our first book “Turn Over a New Leaf” was sprouted from that meeting. Over the next two years we experimented and refined the food program to create an easy to follow eating plan that would give the body maximum nutritional input with a focus on the correct acid/alkaline balance. Vital for perfect health. During that time we had all the tests possible to ensure we were on the right track

Erick promotes a vegetarian ‘vegan’ diet for those of us who are happy to follow. However, he will accept some fish and lamb, for the meat eaters.

The big emphasis is on “no” sugar, “no” white flour, ”no” dairy,  “no” beef or chicken, and surprisingly enough, no fruit except Granny Smith Apples.

After almost three months on the diet, supplements and herbs prescribed by Erick. My “Hay Fever” had cleared up. I lost about four kilos and felt fantastic. Di was also looking and feeling great.

We had a second Blood Analysis done which showed complete eradication of the Mycoplasma, a marked reduction in fungus, a great improvement in our mineral uptake and some improvement in distribution of our blood cells. Our bodies were detoxing and showed a requirement for a change in the vitamins and minerals we were taking. I also had some chemicals coming out of my body cells into my blood, through the detoxification process. I still had traces of blood in my urine and my blood cells were still stacking together, although there were some signs of improvement.

We had been refining our diet now for about fifteen years and I have often wondered over that time whether the changes were working and what I might be lacking in terms of vitamins and minerals. I am rapt that I now have a way of checking my progress and rectifying any deficiencies that may arise.

Di continued to develop new dishes based on the food groups on Erick’s food list. The aim was to develop a wide variety of dishes for all meals so that there is plenty of choice and no chance of boredom setting in.


We had our third blood analysis about five months after the second visit and were absolutely stunned at the improvement both of us had achieved. I was ecstatic at the transformation in my blood, all my blood cells were now completely “free”, totally separated from their fellow blood cells and floating around doing their good work. My immune cells and T Cells had turned into a platoon of “Rambos” in attack mode. No more traces of blood in my urine and no fungus in my blood. Erick gave us both a gold star. On our fourth blood analysis, the results were even better. For me this has been a great achievement. I have always wanted to give myself the best quality fuel to give me the very best base to build my fitness and wellbeing.  Now I have a very powerful tool that allows me to monitor the effects of the food I eat and make the necessary adjustments to give myself the greatest opportunity to live a long and healthy life 

 I am a great believer in the saying “We are what we eat” and if you are making the effort to read our book you probably think the same way.

If we want to improve our health we have to take responsibility for what we put into our bodies, particularly when we reach middle age and the wheels start falling off. We can no longer eat crap, drink crap, stay out all night and feel like doing it all again the next day. The days are gone when fast food was actually food. We must consider that all the preservatives, additives and flavourings that fast food outlets and food manufacturers are allowed to add to our food is an effort to improve their bottom line. The furthermost thing from their mind is our waistline and our health. That doesn’t enter the picture. 

The diet in our book has been thoroughly tested by one of the world’s most famous unknown food connoisseurs who is thriving, and thoroughly recommends it. (that's me!)

If you would like to ease into vegetarianism before making the big jump to being a vegan, get hold of the “Twenty Minute Vegetarian”; that’s what I grew up on (for ten of the last thirteen years anyway)

 “What tremendous effect has this dietary evolution had on my life?” you may ask. Well apart from feeling fantastic and looking fantastic, the guys at the golf club still introduce me this way:
“This is Graeme, he’s a vegetarian, he doesn’t drink, he doesn’t smoke and he makes his own dresses”.

So I guess things haven’t changed much at all. 

If you would like some information on our books go to This Link