Vegan: My Story

Ahhhh, the word vegan is in the title! RUUUUNNN!!

Oh, you’re still here? Golly, hi!

Wait, are you to going to read and judge anyway? I mean that’s the social attitude, isn’t it?

Vegan: narrow-minded, uptight preachers who have nothing better to do than belittling you for your food choices?

Funnily enough, that’s how a lot of omnivores portray themselves to me!

That was a dig. Stay with me.

My upbringing was in a meat-eating household. I ate billy bear ham, crab sticks and roast dinners with the meat alongside and of course Haribos.

Naturally, I ate these things, because that’s the food I was given and didn’t know any different, didn’t even take into account what it was I was eating.

Until I reached the age of 9. My best friend and I at the time loved animals, I can’t remember how it all happened but I had made a firm decision that I wasn’t going to eat these animals anymore.

When I spoke to my parents they weren’t fully against the idea surprisingly… they were sceptical and worried about my future health naturally. Yet they agreed to let me turn vegetarian in year 6 at the age of 10.

I think the fact that I was refusing to eat any meat up until this point helped my case. I’m stubborn when I need to be!

I remember being around the age of 10 and trying to put a bit of fish in my mouth as I’d never had it before – have never liked it. I was in the chip shop where my mum was working at the time. I put a piece in my mouth when no one was around and immediately started to cry.

What on Earth was I doing?!

All I could see in my head were fish in a barrel and somebody shooting them 1 by 1. I spat it out and felt ashamed. That day confirmed my future and my morals.

So skip 10 years down the line of vegetarianism. To 20 years old – crikey! I found veganism.

Veganism to me was an extreme diet. I had thought about it for a few years prior but never went for it. My family and boyfriend were not keen on the idea either. My mum was worried about my health, my dad wanted to make sure I was eating enough and my boyfriend just thought it was plain ridiculous (still does now!)

Honestly, my main reason to go vegan was for ‘health’ reasons, that’s what I told people and myself. When actually I just wanted to be even skinnier and not have cow pus clogging my arteries!

Oo another dig, stay with me.

Research about it!

I won’t start listing statistics, I won’t get into anything nitpicky. I’m not educated enough to have a full-blown debate so I’ll avoid it. All I know is that, I could easily get by on a vegan diet, I was pretty much there already. I had to watch my vitamin levels have a steady protein and calcium intake and I was away!

I have now been vegan for 8 months. I haven’t felt that massive rush that everybody says you have, but then I haven’t been that much of a healthy soul, to be honest. There is many a cheeky junk food item to be had! You don’t miss out that bad! In fact, I’m about to reach for my tub of ice cream so what does that say!

I have benefitted from this in a few ways:

• Learned to cook – I am so much more invested in my food now, what I eat and where my ingredients come from – I hope to even post a few cooking bits on here!

Yes, I still enjoy a banging roast – I’m not that deprived!

• Views – my views originally were to go vegan and get skinnier, that was it. When I started watching videos on YouTube, it hit me just how scary the dairy industry is. I cannot watch any clip that they show for more than a few seconds in these videos of animals being abused, because it is so upsetting to me. Now that I’ve been vegan my views have become more for the animals, and I’m glad they have. In fact I’ve become quite passionate about it.

They are ever growing – a factor I rarely take into account is the positives of my diet have an impact on the environment too!

• Community – I’m now part of an amazing community! I’m involved with Facebook groups, the universities society group chat, I’m signing petitions?! (Never heard of from me before!)

• I’m happy – I feel content with my diet and lifestyle. I won’t lie and say I never crave a ready-made cake, cause I do! But I have such strong emotions that I get over it pretty quickly!

If you know somebody who is terribly anti-vegan. Please remind them that not everybody forces their views down your throats. If they do, they’re doing it for a reason and to give a message. Not because they’re bored and want a scene.

Many now, like myself are still learning, there will never be such a thing as a ‘perfect vegan’. It’s just not realistic in this modern world. So relax and do what you can. You’ll be doing more than you think!

I can assure you that everybody who is vegan at some point said: “I could never be a vegan”.

Maybe you’re saying that too?

Thank you for taking the time to read!

Kara xo

*Disclaimer – these views are mine and what I’ve experienced, I’m not trying to be a pushy gal*