I'm vegan and we eat very little processed food. You really don't need to eat processed food. I can give you some recipes and recommend searching online for anything you want to make because there is so much choice.

Also, my husband worked out whether we are eating enough protein and we are. You really don't need that much, and I'm not sure what makes you think you need to eat protein bars, or what you think you need to eat every day to get the protein, but we get protein from beans, lentils, bread, nuts and seeds. And there's even some in vegetables.

It sounds like you had a vegan diet based on processed food and it was that processed food that was the problem.