Vegans share their biggest challenges and how they overcame them

Is veganism really that hard? We look at some of the challenges vegans faced, or expected to face, and how they overcame them.

Many people say they won’t go vegan because it’s ‘too hard’. But vegans don’t have superpowers or have to be especially self-disciplined. We look at some of the challenges vegans faced, or expected to face, and how they overcame them. Here are 6 vegans sharing their perspectives.

Millie – Vegan FTA, UK

Here’s the experience of Millie, who struggles with various health conditions and was concerned about how they’d navigate veganism considering them:

“Before transitioning to veganism, I had been intermittently vegetarian since childhood. My deep affection for animals has always been a core part of who I am. In my late teens, I became more aware of the origins of our “food”, which ultimately motivated my shift. At that time, I was struggling intensely with my OCD, which severely restricted my diet and led to numerous health issues. The one aspect of veganism that initially frightened me was the fear that committing to a “restrictive” diet might impede my efforts to heal and expand my food choices. However, I was wrong. I firmly believe that veganism played a significant role in helping me overcome this particular manifestation of my OCD.

I took a step back to reflect on why I viewed veganism as restrictive, and I realised that animals are not ours to take in the first place, so how could it be? This profound understanding shifted my perspective entirely, showing me that veganism isn’t restrictive at all—it’s about respecting the inherent value of all living beings. Once I recognised that the use of animals in any sense never aligned with my values, I found it much easier to embrace the small yet necessary changes in my diet.

Veganism is rooted in love and the understanding that all life is interconnected. Every being on Earth is a manifestation of the divine. So, when considering veganism, ask yourself: ’Is it truly restrictive if it was never yours to take in the first place?’”

Nitin Jain – co-founder of Vegan India Movement

“As I was practicing Ahimsa follower, I thought I was already living a life without intentionally harming animals as I was born vegetarian and also actively stayed away from leather, silk, honey from childhood and gave up animal riding once I understood that it is animal slavery. Once I learnt about dairy in being cruel, the only part that was needed for me to go vegan was to accept that what I got to know about dairy is indeed true globally not just in US or big Indian cities. This was also partly due to lack of information available on Indian dairy sufferings 11 years back. I think the other hard part was to make my family members convinced that every glass of milk irrespective of whether it’s coming from gaushala or big dairy is coming from animal cruelty and slavery. There were family concerns related to nutrition too. This convincing happened with more dairy cruelty information available on the local scene by Indian activists and I also actively investigated the local reality and exposed my family to it. On the nutrition side I actively started reading about it and shared that information to my family. Within a few years they realised I am still healthy (probably fitter than earlier) and this concern got buried too. Overall, lack of availability of relevant information in Indian context was the big challenge then.”

Kenny, UK

Kenny elaborates on how an unexpected challenge arose:

“The hardest thing about going vegan is not the food, avoiding cruel products, buying the right clothes or rejecting certain excursions like going to the zoo. The hardest thing about going vegan is realising that most of the people closest to you will not or may not follow. No matter how much you educate them or try to convince them. The hardest part is watching these people continue to participate in the horrors that the animals endure. Watching self-proclaimed “animal lovers” knowingly betray the animals daily. As far as overcoming this, it is an ongoing task that seems to get a little less difficult over time. To sum up, the biggest challenge was to feel the anger and disappointment, then learn to keep it at bay.”

Fabi, Canada

“For me the only reason was the fact that animals are sentient and we exploit them, which is morally wrong and relatively easy to avoid, but I felt like I had to learn and memorise a lot of facts and data to make sure my arguments were “valid” when I talked to other people. I had to learn about plant based nutrition so my family couldn’t argue that I’d die, I had to learn facts about the impact of animal agriculture on climate change so the “conscious people” in denial learned going plant-based is the most impactful change you can make as an individual, I had to learn how many and how we kill these animals all over the world to try to help people grasp the severity and scale of this industry… because it’s just all unimaginable, and it’s kept hidden, and were taught it’s “natural, normal, and necessary”. Luckily, learning these things is relatively easy; there are lots of resources online, and as you start having more and more conversations, they all start consolidating in your head.

[There were] specific challenges like learning about plant-based nutrition and climate change, reading ingredient labels, or researching companies to make sure they don’t test on animals all had a learning curve, but it was pretty easy when you compare it to what I think are the real challenge: the emotional toll of living in a non-vegan world where exploiting others is seen as “normal”. Turning misanthropic is too easy when you realise most people, even when confronted with the truth, refuse to change; having to mingle with people who are choosing every day to pay for what we do to animals and not even being able to bring it up because you’d be seen as an “extremist”, or a “proselytiser”, or at the very least “confrontational”… it really is constant heartbreak everyday. I don’t think I’ve been able to overcome this per se, although socializing with fellow vegans -even if only online- really helps, and getting active, doing something about it, is helpful too.

It’s kinda wild that when we go vegan we suddenly have to become doctors, dieticians, environmentalists and data analysts because we feel like we need to prove to people the severity and scale of what we do to animals… and that’s fine, thanks to the internet. But then feeling crazy for standing on the right side of history by opposing animal exploitation, having to deal with social isolation, mockery, and gaslighting every day… it can be really debilitating unless you seek a support system. Also realising that speciesism, like all other forms of discrimination, is still ingrained in our minds, even when we’re trying to avoid it can be upsetting… but remembering we’re a small group of people trying to change such normalized violence helps keep things in perspective.”

Mahesh Udupa, India

“The only challenge I have faced since going vegan is the reactions from my close network of family and friends. The most hurtful comment was the assumption that my lifestyle change was linked to some mental health issues. I have done my best to make them understand, but what has truly helped me is in becoming an activist. I have taken the battle to the streets, becoming more active than ever, and I intend only to learn and grow.

I realised that while activism at home, provided they pan out in them actually going vegan can bring some degree of inner peace, the true fight is much larger—the battleground is the entire world. Rather than expending energy on those unwilling to even listen, I choose to focus on those who are open to listen and understand—ironically, often strangers. Hence, the real challenge lies in overcoming people’s egos and confronting those conditioned mindsets shaped by years of conditioning.

My goal is to help people challenge their egos by highlighting the victims’ perspective, because only through these difficult conversations can we move closer to a truly vegan world.

Vaibhav, India

“My decision to become vegan was sudden and took some courage from my side, especially because there was no support from my family and my mother was strongly against it. While I had no cravings for milk products (as I anyway had no cravings for any type of food), I had a lot of fights with my mother and had to be extraordinarily stubborn to follow my newfound set of rules. For instance, I had to insist upon replacing ghee with coconut oil in the dishes I had. After a few months, she finally reconciled with the fact that I would be vegan and stopped forcing me to have milk products.

One challenge that I faced was that after going vegan I lost a lot of weight, because I was cutting out curd rice and wasn’t substituting that properly with anything else. It took me several months of weight training to regain my weight, and keeping consistency was also challenging due to my schedule. Now I’m almost the same weight as I was before turning vegan; still a few more kgs until I reach.

If I hadn’t had resistance from family the transition would have been much smoother and easier.

Getting vegan supplements for [vitamin] D3 and B12 just requires a bit of research, but otherwise it’s just a matter of getting adjusted to a few things like alternatives for animal products in our food, clothing and other stuff. The difficulty we face is not in the least bit comparable to the cruel hardships faced by the farmed animals.

Going vegan seems like an overwhelming task, but it’s simply aligning your actions with your values. Hopefully, reading some of the ways vegans dealt with certain issues inspires you to realise how you could make these changes – for yourself and for the animals.

Original source: https://veganfta.com