Personnally I was one of those ''dumb people'' you like to call them believing that vegeterian and vegans were skinny people only. Mainly because I thought: If you are going to cut some food from your diet, im assuming you made research and are going to do it in a healthy way.
And when you think vegan or veggiterian you think fruits, vegetables, nuts etc not fries and chocolates.

Anyways, Ill go to bed less dumb tonight.

BTW: you shouldnt be hurt by comments like that. Its normal that people are ignorant. I look at it as: I dont know everything so why should I expect others to know everything... you should look at it as an opportunity to educate them on the subject because trust me they dont mean to hurt you in any ways they are just curious.

Thankx for the thread :)

Honestly I gained weight when I went vegetarian 7 years ago. But I had just been doing the South Beach diet and lost down to the lightest weight I ever was. I didn't have energy or feel healthy at the time. My body doesnt do weel on alot of dairy products and since I wasnt a huge lover of meats I was eating alot of low fat dairy. But in spite of this, my decision to stop eating meat wasn't because I thought it was healthier for me. I hadn't done any research or even thinking prior to stopping meat. I actually had a dream and it affected me profoundly. In the dream I was asked to kill a chicken if I wanted to eat that chicken. When I protested that I was unwilling to kill an animal then the person asked me simply "well for you to eat it, it has to die. Now why do you think you dont have to kill it then?". I woke up that morning completely freaked out and immediately became a vegetarian. I actually didn't expect it to last, and it didn't completely. When I went fishing again for the first time (like 4 years later) and killed a fish, I started eating fish again. So while not a vegetarian anymore I still abstain from eating beef, fowl and pork or lamb etc.
My initial weight gain I think came because I was eating so little carbs and now suddenly was eating alot of carbs again. I know SBD diet worked really well for me with lbs lost, but it sapped my energy, and even with fast weightloss I wont ever go back to eating meat again. I cant make it ok in my own conscience, and I know my start into veggie then semi veggie is a very strange one, but for me it was powerful, happened overnight and I never had "meat cravings". Sometimes I wonder if eating so much animal protien was part in what triggered that dream?

Anyways I had quite a few veggie friends growing up and I saw them eat cheesy pizza and chips and most were not especially skinny. I never had that notion that vegetarians and vegans are always thin. I do think that being vegan for me would probably eliminate many of my vices. Plain potato chips dont tempt me, but dipped in ranch or french onion dips and I cant leave them alone. This may be why I kinda had a notion that being vegan would make it harder to be overweight. That is until one of my best friends became vegan and while she lost like 10 lbs initially she gained it back plus some over the next year or so. She was al about the meat substitues. She did more baking after becoming vegan and ate alot more sweets. It's as if she replaced her prior cheese addiction with a sugar addition, and at least cheese has some nutrient value besides calories, while sugar does not.

I've been a vegetarian since last fall and I now weigh the most I ever have :tantrum: For me it was easy to stay thin on a meat based diet because most of my meals consisted of fish and chicken. Now I'm eating a ridiculous amounts of junk food and pastas/breads. I've got to learn how to eat 'thin' while also being a vegetarian.

Oh, absolutely. I was eating vegan thanksgiving leftovers (recipe courtesy of the fabulous Isa Chandra Moscowitz) and a friend of my roommate was shocked to find out that I was both overweight and a vegan and had been both my entire adult life.

I think the shock comes that many anorexics/people with disordered eating use vegetarianism/veganism as an excuse. "Oh, I can't eat that , I'm vegan." or only eating foods that are far from calorically dense.