I’ve been a vegetarian for many years. I started when I was in 6th grade after I saw a dog catcher trying to catch a stray yet cute little dog and how he nearly strangled the dog in the process. I tried to help the dog by telling the dog catcher that he belonged to a neighbor. I remember the dog catcher looking at me skeptically and then decided to let the dog go. Afterwards, I ran home to tell my mom and I gave the dog a bowl of water and some dog food. For some strange reason, the connection with the dog catcher and the dog being so ill-treated led me to become a vegetarian. I remembered my mom just happened to be serving hot dogs for lunch that same day and I respectfully declined them not wanting to eat any “dogs”. From then on, I told my mom that I no longer wanted to eat meat. My mom, who has a gentle soul, understood my reasonings but being a mom, was also concerned that I wouldn’t get enough protein or iron.
I stayed a vegetarian for many years after that but because my mom wanted me to be sure I got the proper amount of nutrition in my growing body, tried to encourage me to go back to eating meat. I think she was just thinking of it more from a mother’s point of view and worried that her child wasn’t getting the proper nutrition. I was also a picky eater so that didn’t help the cause. So, I went to eating absolutely no meat to eating chicken only.
And then a few years after that, I realized that eating chicken only deviated from my original motivation in becoming a vegetarian so I decided to stop eating chicken and returned to being a vegetarian. I recalled some of my peers thinking I was strange because vegetarianism back then wasn’t a popular choice nor did people truly understand the reasons to being a vegetarian.
Well, nowadays more and more people are becoming more aware of the personal and social responsibilities in not eating meat and it’s no longer being held “strange” for not wanting to eat a cow, chicken, pig, or seafood. Their are many negative health ramifications to eating too much meat as well as the destructive impact it has on animals and the planet.
Please feel free to take a more in depth look at the reasons to becoming a vegetarian. Click on the link below for more information from the sponsors of World Vegetarian Day and you can enter to win up to $1000 for taking the pledge!
http://www.worldvegetarianday.org/
Go Veggies!
Happymomblogger 
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