Going Meatless with Kristie Middleton (vegan) - Transforming the Way You Eat and Live, Part 3 of 4

"There are so many wonderful personal success stories that I've heard from people over the years. One of my favorite examples that I share in my book is that of Ken Chadwick. Ken was the Dining Services Director at American University in Washington D.C. when I met him. And he kept hearing from students that they wanted more vegetarian/vegan options on their menus. …And so, he quickly teamed up with his dietitian and his chef on campus to ensure that there was a delicious, totally vegan option for breakfast, lunch, dinner and desserts." "After eating a plant-based diet, he started losing weight very quickly, so quickly that his students called him 'The Incredible Shrinking Man.' He felt so much better though, he started exercising; he started running again, he took up boxing and he was able to stop taking all of his medications."

"In my book, I share the story of one community that suffered the impacts of a local egg farm. And they lived there in relative peace and happiness for many years. And then, locally, an egg farmer bought the property down the street from their home. And this was not just any old egg farmer. It was an egg factory farm where they had hundreds of thousands of egg-laying hens confined in cages." "So, there they had hundreds of thousands of egg-laying hens producing tons of waste. And for Lita and her neighbors, sometimes the air was so putrid with ammonia fumes from the waste that they couldn't go outside. It caused their lungs to burn; it caused their eyes to burn. They would get dizzy; they would get nausea and stomach aches."

"My neighbors right here next door have chickens. One was named Goldie and the other one was Red. And Goldie in particular just had this amazing personality. She would come over and eat some of the food on the ground that the other animals had knocked off of the feeder. And then she would go and take a nap, and roll around in the grass here in my yard, take dust baths or something that chickens do naturally in order to keep their feathers healthy."

"And I think a lot of people don't realize that chickens are very intelligent, very sensitive animals, and they would be horrified if they knew the way that these animals are raised in order to produce their food."