Our journey began in 2004 when I read a book by Roger K. Young. In chapter six, which is about the Lord’s antidote for the scourges and plagues of the last days, it had a lot of quotes from Elder John A. Widtsoe’s book The Word of Wisdom. After reading that chapter I told my wife that I thought we should change our diet. As we looked into it we found Dr. Kenneth E. Johnson’s book, The Word of Wisdom Food Plan, and read it. We also found the book The Mormon Diet: 14 Days to New Vigor and Health by Earl F. Updike.
During this time we were occasionally going to a vegetarian restaurant in St. George, Utah. One night there was a book at the table we sat at called The China Study by T. Colin Campbell. I read a little while we were there, then I bought a copy for myself.
When I found information in the book about Dr. John McDougall, we bought a copy of his book and tried the recipes in it. After going fully plant-based, in just two weeks I received an increase in energy, just like it said in 14 Days to New Vigor and Health. We followed that diet pretty strictly for quite a while but gradually we got a little lax about dairy and things with oil in them.