One Month In

 There's no amazing story to "becoming vegan" or anything like that.  Before the kids, I was lacto-ovo vegetarian for over seven years, but with pregnancy cravings, I eventually went back to meat.  There was the transition period where I felt guilty but then that eased.  I hid my little "I'm not a nugget" stickers and my "meat is murder" stamp.  Because fate is an interesting beast, I was gifted a child who went vegetarian when he was around five.  But even answering those questions, I kept pushing my own ethics back... And back... And back...  

I remember a teacher in high school telling us that it took a month to get rid of a habit.  You might struggle with the change, but if you can survive it for a month, then you can kick a bad choice or adopt a positive change.  December 17th- a month ago- I stopped eating any meat or animal by-products.  I'm sitting on a leather couch in my wool socks right now, so I guess it seems weird to be a card-carrying vegan, although the couch was second hand, and I actually don't have issue recycling and reusing things so that they don't go to waste and the sacrifice of the animal was worth it.  Perhaps that is something that will change over time, and I won't be able to do that, but for right now, I know that I couldn't buy something outright.

I thought the change would be hard.  But it isn't.  Ethically, eating meat has always been antithetical to how I feel.  It was just something that I refused to listen to the inner voice about.  If I didn't think about it, I didn't have to worry about it.  If I just accepted my son asking, "Why do you eat meat when you know it's wrong?", then I wouldn't have to ask myself that question.  However, there is something that has happened this time that didn't happen at the start of my vegetarian journey in my 20s.  While my husband went vegetarian for similar reasons a few weeks after me; even when it was just the two of us, cooking for two was difficult.  As someone who grew up cooking and loves it, I found that a struggle, too.  We did it, but there was always a feeling of giving things up.

As this path has unrolled, it opened in front of both of us.  We both decided to embark upon the vegan journey as a team, discussing our philosophical and ethical reasons.  But more than that, it hasn't felt like a sacrifice.  Sure, there are many more (and better tasting) choices in the processed vegan world, but we've both preferred veggies to the faux products.  It's more than that.  

Maybe it's age related.  I'm in my mid-40s now.  I've struggled since I was a teen with an eating disorder; only recently have I been able to deal with the underlying emotional issues that fed that hunger.  Part of that has involved having honest conversations with myself about food and its role in the body.  As I have selected food for the last month, there has been the added conversation of does this food come to me without harm I could have prevented.  There is a freedom in saying yes to that.

Not everything is easy.  In addition to four other picky eating children, I also have a child with ASD and T1D whose diet is very rigid.  Change for him takes time.  Right now, there are still a few meat products in our house for him, and all the kids drink milk.  However, they are open and trying new things.  Rather than force change onto them, we are answering their questions honestly and without judgment for the choices they make.  Would I love it if they all decided in seconds to be vegan?  Sure.  It would make life easier.  But it took me twenty years to even first question the idea of eating meat.  It took almost 25 years after that initial question to ask the next round of questions.  Right now, we are supporting them in where they are on their journey and trying to make the best choices we can within those parameters.

But wow...  A month.  It sounds like a long time, but it's felt like no time, too.  Like yesterday.  Eating doesn't feel like a chore or obsession.  There is an understanding of being hungry and of fueling my body in a healthy- physical, emotional, and ethical- way.  I haven't openly been talking about the decision to anyone because vegans have the reputation of militance.  I don't feel like I need to be anything other than accept where I am on this.  I don't feel like a I need to prove something so someone else or prove to someone else why they should change.  I just feel like I need to live authentically and let the chips fall where they may.