My Vegan Story

 

 

 

So I thought I would share my vegan story as well. Why I am sharing this because it all ties in with things. 

So like I have said in my about story I grew up in the Seventh Day Adventist Church and this all ties in with how I went vegan. 

Okay so lets start from the beginning. Growing up in the SDA denomination they have advocated for plant based eating. Growing up I remember going to potlucks and there was no ounce of meet, dairy or eggs in the food. It was all plant based.  Now this is not say all members are vegan but the faith in general  advocate for vegetarianism/veganism.  All because of Ellen G White (although many people speculate that she was a false profit even though she helped found the church). Ellen was vegetarian I don't think the term vegan was for back then, she was just an full blown vegetarian. 

Because of this I grew up dominantly eating vegetarian food. I did however eat eggs and dairy products. I did eat animals too but my dad new about the issues with animals. Like how they are raised, hormones, treatment etc. Also my grandfather (his dad) himself was a vegetarian. So it was just how I grew up. The only animal products I remember us bringing in the house was occasionally we had chicken and fish. We did used to eat at taco bell and would have cow flesh then and remember once also having a pizza with ground cow on  it. Pizza was horrible by the way, never went back to that pizza place.

I also got sick several times that I ate at Mc Donalds. I got food poising from have cow flesh and also got sick once from having chicken. It was so much that my mom would remind me not to get the chicken from McDonalds because it did not sit well in my stomach. For the most part growing up when would eat there till a certain age I would just eat their fish fillet sandwich. I did start eating cow flesh in a little later in my life. For the most part when was with my dad we would eat vegetarian. With my mom I would eat (I grew up with my parents being separated so would alternate weekend with my mom, weekend with my dad) more animal based proteins.  I really think the second time I got sick from eating a quarter pounder from McDonald's was a wake up call. However, ever since I was a little girl I feel like I was getting the call to be vegan.

On my way to spend time with my mom we would pass slaughterhouse trucks on the hi way. I was naive and thought that they were just moving the animals to a different farm. I remember a while later talking to my dad and he said they were going to the slaughterhouse.  On the highway part from where we would meet my mom and transfer into her car to go to my moms place there was a Schneider billboard and I always used to then start dreaming about then the animals and what they go through at the slaughter house. While Schneider is not a slaughterhouse for some reason it made me think of a slaughterhouse.

 

I am not going to lie, I used to like how animal proteins tasted. My mom used to make a really good roast. But I always felt guilty any time I would eat them. I felt like something greater then me was telling me not to eat animal flesh. Well in 2007 I had my first mental health crises and I just got the link then that I needed to go vegan. I did not go till much later but again the thought I should go vegan was there. Honestly if God really was calling me to Go Vegan all these years I was really bad at obeying him.

 

I remember though touching and handling animal flesh always made me feel grossed out. I remember one time lets say around 2009-2010 I got some chicken breast and was making a soup. I was so disgusted that I did not have one bit of the soup my mom had it all. Finally in 2011 I was working with an organization that helps people with mental health issues, we were working on my resume,  and looking for jobs. She heard on the radio of this organizations that helps dogs and cats over seas by doing massive spay and neuter clinics. I contact them and got involved with volunteer work. After my first clinic in 2012 I started seeking on facebook pages against animal cruelty all because one of the dogs that came to the clinic was attacked by a human with a machete  so it just got me to search for a page against  animal cruelty. In it I found a page (no longer exists) called Animal Cruelty Exposed.  In it I started learning about the cruelty that goes on to animals. In that year of October I decided I was no longer going to eat animals. I still had some fish in between then and when I went vegan. As I continued to learn about what goes on I also got information from a page called the Bloody dairy industry and started learning how cruel and horrible dairy is and in July of 2013 I finally went vegan. 

With all this said the thing I regret the most is not doing it sooner. After I went vegan and shortly after getting involved with activism I created my own page and blog called The Gentle Vegan. You can access that blog by clicking here

So that in a nutshell is my story to going vegan. I may look into putting it in a video one day soon too.