I’ve always thought being vegan was absurd, extreme, unhealthy, unnecessary, blah blah blah…
I’ve spent the last six months transitioning to vegetarian and then vegan. I’ve never felt better, both physically and mentally.
However, I’m becoming more and more irritated with the people around me who refuse to attempt to understand.
I used to be one of those people and I just want to say that I am sorry.
I live with my fiancée who has been a vegetarian for half of her life. I’ve always been pretty supportive of that, but I never really considered going vegetarian myself. Over time it started to become clearer and clearer to me that the right thing to do both morally and for our health was to cut out meat. Yet I always kept just enough cognitive dissonance in the back of my head to eat meat when I was out at restaurants.
In December, my fiancée began listening to a vegan podcast. I was insufferable… “Why are you listening to that!? Don’t tell me you’re going to go vegan… that’s way too many restrictions! Don’t expect me to do it too…”
(I legitimately believe now that I was so opposed to it BECAUSE deep down I knew that it was the right thing to do.)
Eventually she decided she was going to do Veganuary and give it a shot. In an effort to understand her better I started listening to the podcast. After literally one episode I came out of it realizing I had been wrong all this time.
I needed more info so I watched some documentaries. It’s like my whole world had been turned upside down.
We’ve both been vegan since January now, and I have no intentions of eating animal products ever again.
My body feels great, I’m hitting new personal records at the gym, and best of all, my mind and conscience are clear.
All that said, I’m becoming increasingly frustrated with the people around me who are being less than supportive. The worst part is that I look at them and see myself and the way I used to think. At some point in my life, I’ve definitely said “but bacon though.”
I just want to say to as much of the vegan community as possible that I’m sorry I never listened to you.
I was wrong.
