Initially, I would have disagreed with Dr. Bernards assertion that “the average person loses about 10 pounds after switching to a vegetarian diet, even without watching calories and fat grams.” When I became vegetarian, I stayed at pretty much the same weight for a number of months. Of course, this was as I was still eating a lot of processed foods and easing into cooking more.

After about six months, I dropped a couple pounds, mainly because being vegetarian for me no longer meant eating Boca Burgers three times a week. I was cooking a lot more and started buying cookbooks with the same fervor I buy CDs.

About a month before I got married, I really started to notice a change in my weight. Now, after a month-and-a-half, I’m down from 140 to 132. I didn’t think I changed my eating habits much—most of the change, I think, came from the stress of the final days in the wedding countdown. I dropped six of those eight pounds in August and two since. My weight seems to be holding steady where I am.

As the article mentions, if you’re a junk-food vegetarian, you’re not going to magically lose pounds because you stop eating meat. And, really, that shouldn’t necessarily be the goal. I’ve never had any real weight issues, and having a few “extra pounds” is no big deal to me as long as I feel good.

I guess the point of all this is: if you eat whole foods more often and cook for yourself a lot and eat a varied diet rather than meat substitutes every day, you’ll shed a few pounds without having to count calories. That or you could follow Laze’s Diet Plan. ;)