In the beginning...

A little over three years ago, my husband and I rescued our first dog. His name is Tyler and he is an adorable Golden Retriever mix. He was found in a kill shelter as a puppy with his two sisters. A puppy rescue in Maryland went to get them and fostered them until they were 8 weeks old. That's when we entered his life. This is him on the day we brought him home:




"Raising" this little guy really got me thinking about animals and their capacity to feel love, joy, even fear. It was then that I started to make the connection between animals and the food I was eating. I could not imagine Tyler being subjected to the same treatment that farm animals are subjected to. I was sitting on the couch one night, thinking about this so I started researching vegetarianism online. This seemed like an impossible goal for me, since I didn't like vegetables, other than an occasional raw veggie salad. I had also begun studying Buddhism and trying to live a more compassionate life. Then, I stumbled onto the video that changed my life. I found the video Meet Your meat:



I watched no more than 90 seconds of this video and decided NO MORE. There was no reason for any animal to suffer for me to eat. Nothing tasted so good that it made this suffering worth it. I wasn't sure what I would eat, but I knew it wouldn't be a farm animal. I told my husband Steve, who had "dabbled" in vegetarianism years ago, and he was immediately on board with me. I decided that to be successful, I would "ease" into it and still eat fish. I don't know why this was ok, but at the time, it was. And it did make it easier. Eventually, I realized that I couldn't live my "values" while still eating fish. Being from Maryland, steamed crabs were the hardest to give up. Then one day, Steve and I were eating them and we both just felt sad and disgusted. It was the last crab we ever ate.

I was living happily as a vegetarian, unaware (or rather refusing to become aware) of the pain and suffering my dairy and egg consumption was causing. Steve became a vegan about a year and a half ago, but I just couldn't take that step for some reason. Finally, on January 1st of this year, I decided to go one month without dairy or eggs. Well, it only took a few days for me to realize how easy it really is. I never looked back. There really is life after cheese, even for someone as addicted to cheese as I was.

I've been living my life as a vegan, but really more like a junk food vegan. I have decided to turn over a new leaf and start eating more healthy. I need to lose weight, so this should help with that too. I've ordered a Vita-mix so I can get more greens into my diet. I can't wait for it to get here! I've decided to blog about my journey. Maybe I'll even be able to help other junk food vegans out there! And here we go...