8 celebrities who have given up being vegan

In August 2017, Derek Hough told Us Weekly that he was following a vegan diet and it was "easy" particularly because he lived in Los Angeles, California, an area known for having a lot of plant-based eateries and options.

While following a vegan diet, the dancer said he felt "great" and he had more energy and his skin was clearing up.

But he said he only followed a vegan lifestyle for a few weeks before he gave it up. In November 2017, he told People that although he loved being vegan, it just wasn't totally working for him.

Hough explained, "It was great, but I found for me if I'm craving something — like if I'm craving meat, then I'll have it. But I don't eat it as often and I will say that. But for me, it's about the greens … that gives you the energy."

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In one 2017 interview, which was sponsored by animal-rights organization PETA, rapper Waka Flocka Flame said he first opted to follow a vegan diet in 2014 so he could lose weight.

He explained he had gained 45 pounds in one month and he was "tired of" his weight. He said he also followed the diet because he wanted to be healthy.

But in a 2018 interview with Paper magazine, Flame said he had "dropped the vegan card."

"I think the public scared me from being vegan," he told the publication. He said he didn't like the title of being vegan and what he felt it said to others, adding that vegans "scare people and s---, like people are really scared of vegans. They are like the f---ing cops. When vegans are around, people be trying to throw their food under the table, like oh, the vegans!"

He said that he is now a pescatarian (meaning he follows a vegetarian diet but makes an exception for fish) and he calls himself "a conscious eater," meaning he thinks carefully about what he eats and drinks.

When asked if she was vegan in 2010, Zooey Deschanel told Health magazine that she wasn't anymore.

"My older sister, 'Bones' star Emily Deschanel, has been a very, very committed vegan since high school. I wish I could be like that, but I'm not," she told the publication.

"I have a lot of food sensitivities — I can't eat wheat or soy — and it was very difficult to eat and get enough calories. It was even impossible to eat at a vegan restaurant," she added.

In 2011, the "New Girl" actress also told New York magazine that "to be a gluten-free vegan is, like, the most difficult thing you could possibly be ... and I lasted, like, six months."

Around 2008, Ellen DeGeneres switched to a vegan diet for ethical reasons and so she could "have energy," per an interview with Shape magazine in 2010.

In that same interview, she said she followed a diet of "no animals, no dairy, nothing processed; a lot of soup, veggies, rice, beans, legumes."

But in her 2019 Netflix stand-up comedy special "Relatable," DeGeneres told a joke about being vegan but followed it with, "I'm not really vegan, I say it for the joke ... I was vegan for eight years and I really believe that it's great for you."

She added, "I was healthier than I'd ever been, I loved being vegan. But just in the last year or two for no reason really, I started eating a piece of fish once in a while. And I'll eat eggs from chickens I know — if they are in someone's backyard and they're wandering around and they're happy."

Per Today, Kristen Bell has been a vegetarian since she was 11 years old and she said she went vegan in 2012 after watching "Forks Over Knives," a documentary examining degenerative diseases and their connection to animal-based and processed foods.

But Bell said she realized that the diet wasn't sustainable for her while she was pregnant with her first child. She told Today, "During my first pregnancy, I was working and it felt like I needed more calories. I was pretty conscious of it."

Today, Bell said she is a vegetarian though she said she supports those who follow a vegan diet.

"I think being vegan is a wonderful way to live and it has great effects on the body," she told Today. "I also think it has really good effects on the environment."

Natalie Portman has been an outspoken supporter of a vegan lifestyle for many years now — she even launched a now-defunct vegan shoe line back in 2008.

But when she got pregnant in 2011, she said that she had to give up the vegan diet. She told radio station Q100, "I actually went back to being vegetarian when I became pregnant, just because I felt like I wanted that stuff. I was listening to my body to have eggs and dairy."

Portman said she has, however, since made the transition back to veganism and in 2018 she told Us Weekly that she and her children follow a vegan diet.

It seems Anne Hathaway first went mostly vegan around 2011, in part because she was trying to lose weight for her role as Catwoman in "The Dark Knight Rises," per HuffPost.

She said she kept up a vegan lifestyle for a few years until she was filming the movie "Interstellar." In 2014 she told Harper's Bazaar that the shoot for the movie took place in Iceland and it was physically demanding — she spent most of her day in a 40-pound spacesuit.

She also told the publication that she gave up her vegan diet when she felt compelled to try a fresh piece of fresh fish while at a restaurant in Reykjavik, Iceland.

Hathaway said the next day, after eating the fish, she "just felt better." She added that when she was following a vegan diet, she "just didn't feel good or healthy, not strong."

She told the same story to Tatler in 2018, elaborating, "I had a piece of salmon and my brain felt like a computer rebooting." Since then, she has reintroduced meat, dairy, and eggs into her diet.

Actor Liam Hemsworth had been following a vegan diet for four years until a health scare in February 2019 had him rethink how he ate.

"[In] February of last year I was feeling lethargic. Then I got a kidney stone. It was one of the most painful weeks of my life," he told Men's Health magazine. " ... I had to go to the hospital and get surgery."

He explained that although he thought his diet was "super healthy," he "had to completely rethink" what he was eating after the kidney stone, which he said was caused by consuming too much oxalate. High amounts of oxalates can be found in popular vegan foods, like beans, spinach, and beetroot.

Hemsworth explained that he had initially followed a vegan diet for health reasons and he "felt great" following it at first, even though things have changed.

"What I say to everyone is, 'Look, you can read whatever you want to read. But you have to experience it for yourself. You have to figure out what works best for your body,'" he told Men's Health. "If something works well for a period, great, keep doing it. If something changes and you're not feeling great, you've got to reassess it and then figure it out."