Getting used to my New Life Style

I last ate meat on July 23, 2010, 19 days ago.  I'm pretty used to it.  It seems natural.  My sons, while still meat eaters, understand that I don't eat meat any longer and are interested in what I eat.  Sometimes they want to eat what I'm eating, but mostly they don't.  :::chuckle:::  It's probably harder helping other people get used to my meatless ways.

Today a few people from work took me out to lunch.  All I wanted was a decent salad.  I love salads and my absolute favorite has garbanzo beans, green/red/yellow/orange/any color peppers, grape tomatoes, 10 black olives, cucumbers, red onion, and a tablespoon or so of pecans or sunflower seeds.  I don't eat cheese or meat in my salad.  I was supposed to pick a place and there were no good vegan restaurants nearby.  There was an Indian restaurant that looked good, but not everyone ate Indian food.  My girlfriend wanted to go to a Tapas restaurant, but they had very little variety for meatless dishes.  All I wanted was a good salad.  So, I suggested an Italian place close to work that I knew served good salads.  We ended up going there and we all had salads.  However, I was the only one who didn't add meat.

Before I stopped eating meat, I thought vegetarians and especially vegans were kind of weird and "out there, out of the norm."  And OK, maybe we are a little, but it's such a healthier way of eating.  When we were talking about food at lunch today, I announced that I no longer ate meat.  Two of the women, who are my friends, knew I'm not eating meat, but the other three did not.  Their reactions mirrored what mine would have been before I stopped eating meat.  I could tell they thought it was a little extreme.  That's OK.  I can be different, especially about this.

I don't miss meat and over the past 19 days, I have felt different ... better actually.  I don't have a lot of aches and pains, but I was having some joint pain in my hip and that's disappeared.  I don't retain as much fluid as I used to.  I'm sure that is due in part to me eating much less processed food.  I eat more fresh food than I ever have in my life.  It's little changes that have happened and after the change has been in place for a few days or so, it hits me in the face, and I think, "Yeah, that feels better now."  

I still belong to the Eat 2 Live Yahoo! group.  I used to read some of their posts and think, yeah, right!  I'm so sure they feel that much better or have had so many things improve just because they don't eat meat or dairy.  And true, I still eat some dairy (very limited, but still I do), but there has been a profound difference.  It's hard to even think about eating meat again when I've experienced the changes first hand.  Plus, my father died at 46 from a heart attack and both of his sisters (still living) have had heart attacks.  I don't want to go down that same road.  There isn't heart disease on my Mom's side of the family like on my Dad's side, but there is a strong possibility I could end up with the same fate as my Dad and two Aunts. If all that wasn't enough, I drive by the cattle trucks on the way to the slaughter houses on the tollways in Chicago and I really HATE seeing the cows' noses poking out of the holes in the sides of the truck since I know where they are going. 

So, I continue on my quest.  I need to set a goal to start drinking my coffee black.  That is my biggest stumbling block to not consuming any dairy products.  Once I do that, the rest of the dairy will be a piece of cake to eliminate, as right now, it's basically pizza.  I figure I can still have it without any cheese at all or I can try a very light sprinkling of vegan cheese.  :::shudder:::   Nah, it would probably be better to go without.  :)