Quote:
Originally Posted by
Digger 
I imagine every vegetarian who has ever gone back to meat-eating once said the same things that are being said in this thread and with just as much emotion. Maybe moreso. Since there is no way to answer affirmatively about something that hasn't occured yet, I put 'maybe'.
I became a vegetarian at age 12 and stayed one until age 18 when I became vegan. I was vegan until I was 21, fell back to vegetarian then got back to veganism at 23 until 24. During all of this time I was very active with my animal rights activism. I even was working to throw a huge vegan festival. My marriage, where I had found love and had two children, began falling apart. I became severely depressed. I found myself back at vegetarian. After our marriage ended and he took the kids for the weekend and refused to bring them back (legal here since he was the father) I got the suicidal kind of depressed. The only thing that kept me alive was not wanting my kids to grow up without me. I started eating meat again, I started eating *anything* and used food as an emotional crutch.
Some of my friends, particularly one who worked for PETA, were so disappointed in me and it threw them for a huge loop that someone that was once so passionate about this lifestyle could fall away from it. But the ones who could see me on a daily basis said they understood and told me the fire was gone from my eyes and I just seemed sad.
Thankfully now, 3 years later, life is good. I'm working my way back up...slowly...to veganism and I'm getting back the passion I had. Part of that can be attributed to now having joint custody of my two oldest kids and my ex-husband finally admitting he too had faults in the marriage (prior to now he said it was all my fault). I'm in a job I love at a local organic market. And I have an amazing support system of family (like my husband) and friends...particularly two from this forum (Chelsea and Heather) who stayed friends even during the rough times when I was ashamed that I had fallen off the wagon.
Anyways, I'm rambling. My point was just to agree with the quote. For me this lifestyle is no longer about "Will I be a vegetarian for the rest of my life" more as "when I'm on my deathbed with I look at my life and be happy". I don't look back on my time off the wagon with guilt, I look at it as being human...and in the end that's all I want to be able to say...I was human, I made mistakes, but in the end I was happy.
Agreed with PF that meat and other animal products just aren't food to me anymore.
