Why weren't you vegan before you became vegan?

[satirecafe]

I really didn't know shit about shit. I thought that cows made milk all the time and needed to be milked or they'd die. I don't remember how exactly it happened, but one day about 3 1/2 years ago I just woke up and realized how wrong I was.

[pavotrouge]

Too be honest, I was put off the whole thing by my "role-model vegan" aka the only vegan among the people I knew who is a nice and devoted guy, but extremely a cliché hippy-selfknit-pullovers-AR-activist... made it look like one has to be perfect, ethically and otherwise, to be a vegan.

[bexter]

Born and raised meat eater. I'm ashamed to admit that I was a serious meat eater too... :( Ignorance.
No more - I'm a newbie vegan (10 months in) and healthier/happier.

[steven1222]

1) I thought I needed dairy products for protein and calcium.
2) For most of my life, my parents supplied everything for me. My father believes that humans have a right to do anything they want to with animals.
3) I thought there were no practical alternatives to animal products.

I never ate much meat, because I disliked the way it tasted. During the last five years of my indiscriminate use of animal products, I ate meat only four times.

[Bic]

-When I was little kid my mom subscribed me to a "cute" animals magazine that was actually a graphic animal rights 'zine.

-I watched the channel "Animal Planet" when I was younger. I recall seeing many stories on animal abuse with very graphic pictures to accompany narration.

-When I was little, my parents forced me to eat the meat on my plate before going to bed. The taste, texture, knowledge of its origin, all made me want to gag.

-I tried to be vegetarian and wasn't very good at it (forgot to check lables, ask about food content, etc.)

-Online friend [vegan] posted a crazy amount of videos, pictures, articles, etc. about animal cruelty on her journal.

The last one sent me full force into veganism.

[Tikkin]

Because I never realised how animals suffer to produce food. I started off being vegetarian after getting a free 'go veggie' pack, then looked more into it and decided to become vegan. I also love chickens and turkeys as animals (I want to get my own when it's possible) and can't bear the thought of them suffering.

[Manzana]

Because I had never ever met any vegetarians until I was 18 and moved to the Uk....

In Spain is almost heresy not to eat meat and fish... My parents and everyone around me in Spain think that you need meat to be healthy (my mum still thinks that I am not really a vegan but I have an eating disorder!!!)

After a year of living in the UK I decided that being a vegetarian was the best option (animal righs was my main concern)

But then it took me 5 years of vegetarianism before I became a vegan...

It is scary to think that i had never considered that cows do not give milk unless they have given birth... It is especially scary because I consider myself an intelligent and educated person (and until 3 days ago I used to be a Science teacher!!!)...

After i found out that animals are exploited, I forced myself to read and watch everything that I could... becoming a vegan was easy after that...
I am glad I opened that door and now I can never go back...

(I have also managed to turn my dad vegan too!!!!)

[greenspex]

Wow Manzana, that's one big achievement! Your dad?!
Most of it's been said - ignorance, country upbringing and the machismo of being able to pluck a pheasant ;) , skin a rabbit, gut a trout... I even visited veal calves and it must have affected me because I remember it, but it was like I had a steel wall to prevent me from making that connection - conditioning.

Then one day I was peeling the skin back from a leg of chicken and this really thick artery was attaching it so I had to really pull... and at last - connection made. Sh*t! This was an animal!!!! (doh but honestly, it was that way). I was 20 and started by giving up meat only, but was thinking desperately "what do I eat?" This was in 1985 and there weren't any role models or info really to help apart from Cranks cookbooks. I lapsed on and off then in 1990 went veggie. Then, wonder of wonders, I came across Viva!. In 1993 I gave up eggs, then got some stuff through about the dairy industry in 1995 and became vegan.

So ignorant. It's scary realising how slow we can be to connect. I'd never be anything else now.

[musicalveg]

I have been vegetarian since birth, along with the rest of my family.
Then, 3years ago, aged 13, whilst on holiday had time to do some thinking, and then when I realised how this was the best option for my concscience! Before this, I had not heard of veganism very much- and definately hadn't thought it through- so when I did it was obvious.
I turned vegan with no problems, and my family have been supportive- we now only have vegan margerine in the house, to allow less confusion! My father is mostly vegan- as he eats with me, and usually ends up eating vegan in other countries:)

[howdawg]

I was vegetarian for many years before going vegan, and I had always said 'If I could afford it, I'd go vegan'. Looking through the supermarkets at all of the expensive vegan foods, I failed to realize that vegetables would make up a majority of my diet :)..

I also disliked vegetables very much when I was younger and this continued until the later years of my vegetarianism. I originally went vegan for health reasons (I was extremely overweight as a vegetarian). The more I did it the more I liked it, and I knew after about a week or so I wouldn't go back.

[greenspex]

I have been vegetarian since birth, along with the rest of my family.


I'm so glad for you musicalveg, that you have never contaminated your current body with the karma of suffering animals, apart from dairy that is ;)
A very dear friend of mine was veggie from birth, I think it's one of the very few things that inspires any kind of vague envy in me - karma-envy :) The fact that meat, fish and eggs have never passed his lips is just wonderful. I think it brings home to me so strongly how ignorant I was.

But he says (because he is so very nice) that he has no idea how hard it is to have to find the strength it must take to change when in the midst of family, friends and even husband who still eat meat and believe bloodsports are a human right:rolleyes: . I guess he has a point (although my ex-husband did become vegan :p)

Howdawg, you look pretty good now it has to be said - guess eating all those veggies has paid off :)

[SpaceMonkey]

When I was really young, I always felt that eating meat was wrong, but I didn't stop. The only reasons I had to justify my meat eating were that it tasted good and that everyone else ate meat. Looking back on it now, I realize that those reasons certainly don't justify it. I was just scared of what my parents and friends would say about it.

[hollybee]

I have to admit, I liked meat when I ate it. I liked cheese and other dairy products. What made me stop was realizing that it was having an adverse effect on my health (I read Fast Food Nation, AND watched Supersize Me). Like others, I believed it would be too hard to give up slaughterhouse products. What finally made me become vegan was the cost of organic, free-range eggs and organic dairy products. I buy them for my family, but I wasn't willing to eat them at the high price. Now, just feel healthier without them.

[boomshanka]

I could'nt have been Vegan before. I was brought up exactly the same way as the majority of children are brought up today, eating meat.

My family were always animal lovers but not veggie. My introduction to animal rights was through a scool teacher who wore a badge saying 'STOP ANIMAL EXPERIMENTS'. I asked what that meant and boy did that take me on a journey!

I think the jump from veggie to vegan is vast for some people and unimaginable to others. It's a case of being with the right people at the right time in your life that guides you to veganism and hopefully keeps you there!

[oofdiblunk]

My husband and I went Veg since Sept. I tried to be Vegan during this time and found myself eating products with milk and eggs from time to time. I never realized all of the toxins in these products. For my job, I work with kids on feeding ( I am a speech therapist). My partner explained to me that kids with milk allergies were put on Pediasure formula instead of regular formula as recommended by doctors and professionals in the area. However, my partner was telling me that kids were vomiting and getting sick from the casein in the milk products. That it actually curdled in their stomachs. So I came home and told my husband (then fiance') and he stumbled upon the Dr. T. Colin Campbell study online. After seeing that as well as Earthlings and other important films, we have been strictly Vegan since after Christmas. I know we are newbies at this but in my heart I know that we will always be Vegan!

[auntierozzi]

For years I have been trying to eat healthily with plenty of vegetables, pulses and occasional 'organic' meat which was usually chicken or fish and occasionally red meat. There are a lot of people around me who are in to environmental issues (no vegans) and they talk about 'humane' methods of producing meat. As I heard more about people I knew involved in killing animals that they had known, I knew that I was a massive hypocrit to buy meat that others had killed because I knew that I would never have been able to kill it myself.
In 2005 my Gma died of a massive heart-attack and and a good friend, an older lady, suffered a serious stroke. Both represented the values my family had always had, that a little bit of everything, meat, cream, cheese etc..does you good. And there were two people I loved who had not benefited from this philosophy.....I am lucky to be part of a very loving family who always did what they thought was the very best for me and the emotional link that there was for us between food and love was difficult to break. As I read more about the production of milk and the suffering connected with it I just wanted to stop eating anything that caused harm. It was the most important thing to me and now the most important thing is to try and convince the maximum number of people that I can that they don't need to rely on animal protein as so many people firmly believe they do...
I feel sorry that I needed so much time to get to this point but I agree with the others that it is best to just concentrate on moving on and not waste time looking back. I take my hat off to all those dedicated vegans decades younger than me and those older who have been at it longer!!! :-)

[emmydu]

i was brought up eating flesh, eggs, dairy etc. so i didn't think there was anything wrong with it.

then i started to find it revolting to be eating dead animals and realised we DON'T need it and we shouldn't be eating them. after all, if we truly were meant to be carnivores we would have shorter digestive tracts and would actually like the smell of road kill etc.

so i was vegetarian for about a year before i became vegan, simply because i liked everything with eggs and dairy in it, and i saw nothing wrong with eating them. but now i find it absolutely gross to be eating chicken periods and something that is meant for a calf and only a calf. =]

[horselesspaul]

About 16 years ago I realised that the hypocricy of lacto-ovo-vegetarianism was baaad, m'kay.
My daughter (previously a life long l-o-veggie) worked it out for herself at 14, which makes me look pretty slow.

[catala]

Because I was a sheep.

[Marrers]

I have been vegan for about 13 or 14 years now. For about 5 years before that I was a fairly lax 'vegetarian' (I even ate tuna at first but eventually dropped that - however I didn't know much about by products, gelatine etc).

While I was veggie I actively avoided finding out about veganism - because in my heart I knew it was the same arguement followed to its logical conclusion.
I didn't want to be a vegan because I thought all vegan food was bland and boring and I didn't to change my life / make my life difficult. In particluar I didn't want to give up chocolate, ice cream and cheese.

Then I accidentally started reading the bit at the front of the Animal Free Shopper where it talks about the reasons for being vegan. That was it.

I gave myself 2 week binge of eating all the things I would never eat again, gave away all my leather shoes and ordered a pair of hugely expensive made-to-measure vegan shoes and became a super strict vegan (more strict than than some of my friends who had been calling themselves vegan at that time!)

I was totally obsessed at one point but eventually got things into what I feel is a realistic perspective and now just do my best.

[RedWellies]

Because I was a sheep.

But then you would have been vegan ;)

[Charlotte]

I wasn't really conscious of veganism until I was about 18/19 (I was ovo lacto vegetarian since I was nine) then it took me awhile to make the changeover.(I've been totally vegan with no slip ups for about 2 years)

I started not to eat meat or fish (or dead animal byproducts) when I was very young but didn't have the information/awareness about the dairy and egg industries.

[Enchantress]

But then you would have been vegan ;)

But sheep do insist on wearing wool :p.

[RedWellies]

:D

[Quincy]

I became Vegetarian in September 2005 and wasn't even thinking about veganism at that point...

Once I started learning more about it, I wanted to become vegan by lprobably December or so.
What was holding me back, was the fact that the vegan food selection on campus was very limited and since I don't have much money, I was kinda "stuck".
I finally decided that even though it would be very hard at college, I just had to do it. I was tired of being a hypocrite and making excuses.
Not all choices in life are supposed to be easy!

So, I became vegan in March 2006, which was much sooner than I would have ever dreamed imaginable! There's no turning back now!

The cafe has been somewhat more vegan-friendly this year, so that's a plus...