choosing to go vegetarian: the prequel

I have to start this by saying how very blessed I am. I constantly see posts on facebook and various forums from vegetarians and vegans all over who constantly face ignorance and judgement from people who don't understand, like, or support their dietary decision. I have a vegan friend and several members of Sean's family are vegetarian, so not only do I deal with minimal judgement, I am also surrounded by like-minded people which really makes this new journey a lot more pleasant.

People deal with this every day. I am so fortunate to not be one of them.

Although I never feel judged, I do hear one question very often (no, it isn't "how do you get your protein?" Thank God.). It's a legitimate question and I feel it is important to have solid reason if I am to keep myself accountable. The question is simply "why?"  Why am I doing this? Why now? What on earth made me choose this?

Fair enough. I will briefly go over my decision in a short series of posts over the next few weeks. Today is a prequel of sorts. Looking back, I feel this decision has been a long time coming.

I grew up with very simple tastes and in a home with a not-too-adventurous dinner list. Spaghetti was by far the most-served entree. Nobody in the house liked seafood or coffee (and to this day, only my sister likes those!). Ground beef was most often used, and again, we rarely ventured out to try new things. With three kids who were picky in their preferences, I can't say I blame my mom too much for not wanting to bother.

To illustrate how conservative our eating habits were, I dated a guy right out of high school who loved tortellini. Not only had I never tried it, I'd never even heard of it. I'm pretty sure I also thought Filet Mignon was a fish entree and had no idea there were different "levels" of steak, as it were.

Aside from our boring menu habits, I do enjoy vegetables. We were all (and still are) HUGE lovers of broccoli. There was never an issue getting any of us to eat that. It was frozen broccoli, but hey. Also, my dad grew (and still grows) veggies in our backyard: corn, cucumbers, radishes, and tomatoes primarily. Yum. Tomato sandwiches to this day are a favorite of mine, but those tomatoes only come from a garden or farmer's market!

Before I finally made the choice to go vegetarian, I'd noticed something more and more. Whenever I ate out, I would inhale the sides/veggies before I even touched my entree. Often, I would end up too full to eat said entree anyway. I certainly didn't feel like I'd missed out, though I did feel wasteful.

I think this was the reason that in high school, I once said to friends that I could easily survive as a vegetarian.     This was my freshman or sophomore year, so over ten years ago. Everything was in place, but I didn't make the choice.

Check back next week to find out what influenced my decision!

[update: read part two here!]


Thanks to Coastal Charm for sharing my story!