Bad Vegetarian

By Lauren Belcher
Project #4
Audience: People
Why? A funny look at the life of a non-typical vegetarian.
Word Count: 725 words

I am a terrible vegetarian, the type who doesn’t eat enough variety to stay healthy. My first month of vegetarianism was downright dangerous.

Imagine me, six months ago. I was a carnivore. I ate meat 2-3 times a day, and loved it. One day, I ran across an e-mail about chick culling. I was intrigued and decided to check it out.

Farms cannot profit off of male chicks. They can’t lay eggs and they can’t be used for slaughter. The farmers’ thought: why waste the feed? Chick culling is when the shell egg producers pick out the male chicks and throw them into high-speed grinders.

I swore off meat September 18, 2009.

Only problem is, I’m a picky eater. I won’t eat the following: tomatoes, onions, peppers, mushrooms…pretty much anything that goes on top of a salad or sandwich. Like I usually do, I made a quick decision without thinking it through. It was three days before my 21st birthday and now I’m making a life changing decision. Wonderful.



My first vegetarian meal was at my work, a Tex-Mex stand. I walked up feeling confident and looked at the menu. Well, my usual was the nachos, but I wouldn’t really like it without the meat. Same with the quesadilla. “I guess I’ll have what the other vegetarians order, the bean burrito,” I said.

I’m not a huge fan of beans but I figured I’d better start liking them. So we go down the line as my co-worker is making my burrito. Rice? Sure. Beans? Yes please, the black ones. What vegetables would you like? Uhh… I was staring at containers full of tomatoes, onions, Pico de Gallo, guacamole, corn salsa and several other things that looked equally non-appealing. I told him, just put what vegetarians usually get.

He laughed. My stomach turned as he put all of the above in my burrito. When he was done my burrito looked lumpy and it oozed salsa. I forced a smile and took it from him. “I can do this,” I told myself.

The first bite was the worst. I bit down on a tomato and felt the fleshy pulp slither down my throat, and I was no longer optimistic about my new decision. I ripped open the burrito and forced myself to continue but a few more bites in I quit. At that point the burrito looked sad for me. It was an oozing mess, a total representation of what I would be eating for the rest of my life. Defeated, I left.

The next week consisted of me eating what I normally ate, without meat. My three main food groups were: French fries, pasta and triple layer nachos from Taco Bell. Now that I had plenty of options for food, I decided, “Hey! Why not go vegan?”

So I got rid of my jug of milk, all my cheese and the eggs in my refrigerator just as quickly as I did meat a few weeks earlier. I could no longer have French fries because they are fried in the same oil as meat. I couldn’t really eat pasta because I couldn’t have my usual cream sauces or butter. But Taco Bell was still fine, as long as there was no cheese or sour cream in my food.

Another week of this and I became sick. Really sick. I was dizzy all the time and was seriously lacking the nutrients that my body needed. I had vertigo and was told that I needed to give up the lifestyle.

I couldn’t. After the things I’ve seen, I could not go back to eating meat. So I made a change. I obviously couldn’t be vegan but I could still be a vegetarian. I just needed to eat what I liked. I love squash, zucchini and broccoli. Green beans are my favorite. Maybe I could do this after all.

Today, I’m healthy. I eat a wide variety of foods and introduced soy products as my replacement for meat. There are more selections for vegans and vegetarians than there was five years ago. I’ve learned to adopt new grocery stores and eateries that supported my lifestyle. I replaced milk with soymilk but I still eat the occasional meal with egg and cheese. One day I would like to go full vegan again, but for now, I’m happy to be healthy.

Image from Google Image