I first became interested in veganism about a year ago. It was never my intention—in fact, it was a little bit of an accident. I saw vegans on social media who attributed all their successes to their diet, and I thought I could join their ranks. This didn’t quite work out how I expected it to.
I didn’t undergo some dramatic physical transformation. I’ve seen hundreds of inspiring progress pictures pre and post becoming vegan, but I soon found out this wasn’t going to happen for me. I love smoothie bowls, but I’m no health goddess; I love doughnuts and ice cream and Taco Bell, and I have the muffin top to prove it. My skin isn’t perfect. In fact, for a few months after I began to cut out dairy, it was the worst it’s ever been. Thankfully that’s over, but I can bank on at least one or two pimples appearing every month. Not even my health has dramatically improved. To be fair, I usually don’t even catch colds very often, but I haven’t gained the boundless energy that others seem to.
In addition, no matter what anyone says, being vegan is definitely more difficult than not. That’s not to say I struggle to find food, but when I go out I have to make sure to ask about ingredients in items I wouldn’t have thought twice about before. More than a few times, I’ve had to settle for filling up on fries. As a college student, I’m often faced with free pizza that I have to turn down. And sometimes in the middle of the night, I’ll have to repress a sudden craving for a McFlurry.
However, there is a great deal that veganism has done for me and for my outlook on the world. I’m much more conscious of what I’m eating. In looking for animal ingredients, I’ve found myself reading a lot of food labels. Not only is it tedious to analyze every ingredient in a list that spans several inches, it’s often frightening. There are ingredients I vaguely recognize from organic chemistry and some that I can’t identify at all. More and more, I’ve found myself forgoing these and opting for something else or to prepare my own food. I’m also more in tune with my body. When I first started cutting out animal products, I was careful to monitor my health and energy levels to make sure nothing went wrong. I found that meals heavy in dairy left me bloated and nauseous afterwards, perhaps a sign of a lactose intolerance I’d suppressed. When trying to figure out why I was still breaking out since I wasn’t eating dairy, I found that a pimple or two was inevitable around a certain time of the month or the few days after I had greasy food. If I found myself particularly tired one day, I could pinpoint if I hadn’t been eating enough or if what I had been eating wasn’t nutritionally sound.
Finally, and vastly more importantly, I’m more conscious of my impact on the world. Veganism as a movement is for animals and any other benefits are happy accidents, not the main goal or a guaranteed reward. I’ve been vegetarian my whole life, and I thought that was enough. If I wasn’t eating an animal, I wasn’t really hurting it, was I? But, I watched documentaries about factory farming and saw chicks thrown alive into meat grinders or cows crammed into pens and realized I could be doing just a little more.
I also realized that not supporting the meat and dairy industries didn’t absolve me of all blame; it didn’t mean I don’t support any other inhumane practices. A food blogger mentioned fair trade chocolate, and I found out that a great deal of cocoa is grown using slave labor. One vlogger explained the benefits of secondhand shopping; I realized that fast fashion is ubiquitous, and my closet full of Forever 21 dresses and Charlotte Russe shoes solidifies my status as part of the problem. I could go on, but ultimately, veganism paved the way for me to become more aware of what goes on in the world to make it possible to sustain my lifestyle. It forced me to consider that I’m part of the problem and how I can reduce my impact. It doesn’t solve all of my or the world’s issues, but it opened my eyes, and that might be the most valuable thing it’s done for me.