Recently, in my Face­book sta­tus updates, I have men­tioned my deci­sion to stop eat­ing meat.  This is some­thing I have been want­ing to do for a long time.  For quite some time, basi­cally, as far back as I can remem­ber, I have dis­liked meat.  I remem­ber when I was young I would try to chew it as lit­tle as pos­si­ble and swal­low it nearly whole, because I just did not like it.  When I got into high school, I often avoided meat.  In col­lege, when I was eat­ing res­i­dence hall food, I sub­sti­tuted a bowl of cereal for meat.  I real­ized that was unhealthy, but at the time I didn’t have any friends who were veg­e­tar­i­ans, and I didn’t know where to go for resources on mak­ing my diet more bal­anced and health­ier.  Instead of con­tin­u­ing on, I decided to eat meat again.

When I was preg­nant, I was par­tic­u­larly averse to meat.  Dur­ing my preg­nancy with K, I remem­ber try­ing to get some ground beef out of the pack­age and nearly throw­ing up because I smelled it.  One night, dur­ing my preg­nancy with A, I made a sausage and sweet potato hash that turned me off to both of them for a very long time.

Over the past year, I’ve done quite a bit of read­ing on where food comes from and the whole foods move­ment.  I have also devel­oped rela­tion­ships with peo­ple in my com­mu­nity who are big believ­ers in whole foods, organic when pos­si­ble, and mak­ing food a pri­or­ity.  In addi­tion to this, Jason and I had sev­eral dis­cus­sions on an unre­lated sub­ject that led me to decide that it was time.

In North Dakota, eat­ing veg­e­tar­ian is not “nor­mal.”  I don’t know many peo­ple who are veg­e­tar­ian.  I grew up in an area that had a fair num­ber of ranch­ers.  I now live in an area that grows pota­toes.  You put those two together and what you get is a lot of meat and pota­toes.  There­fore, it stands to rea­son that being a veg­e­tar­ian  in North Dakota is abnor­mal and pos­si­bly even weird.  I finally decided I’m okay with that.  After hav­ing chil­dren and hav­ing to explain deci­sions that I have made that seem to be “weird,” I decided that I am worth it.  I can make a choice for me that is dif­fer­ent than what most peo­ple choose for themselves.

In doing so, I have enjoyed my food in a way I have not for quite a long time.  Also, I have found SO many great meals!  MeatlessMonday.com has some great food.  Friends of mine who make it quite clear they are NOT veg­e­tar­ian have sent me recipes for deli­cious meals.  We have two new cook­books that are great resources.

I have been talk­ing about my deci­sion to eat veg­e­tar­ian quite a bit more than I intended, and I real­ized the rea­son I am doing this is because it feels good to be me.  I have not liked meat, nor have I wanted to eat much of it for as long as I can remem­ber.  Mak­ing this deci­sion has been free­ing.  For me, the deci­sion is to eat veg­e­tar­ian.  What is it for you?  As much as I can, I urge you to go for it!  Be authen­tic, and make that deci­sion.  You deserve to be you and be com­fort­able in your body.