Choosing Love Over Cruelty: My Journey to Veganism
From as early as I can remember, animals were my refuge.
When the world felt too loud, too harsh, or too confusing, they were where I turned. I felt seen by them in a way I rarely did by people. Their presence was calm, gentle, and safe. To me, they were more than companions; they were my sanctuary in the storm, my silent protectors when life overwhelmed me.
I grew up in a typical meat-eating family. My dad enjoyed hunting back in those days, and one of my uncles ran a small dairy farm. It was just part of life around me—normal, unquestioned. But even then, something inside me felt different.
Looking back, I realize I had quiet moments of resistance even then. Like the day my family accidentally took a wrong turn and ended up near a slaughterhouse—an image of a mutilated cow forever etched in my young memory. Or the time I refused to dissect a frog at school because it didn’t feel right. Those were just a few signs among many—small whispers of awareness—but I wasn’t ready to connect them to the choices I was making at the table.
As I got older, I went through some very difficult chapters—relationships that left me feeling isolated, unheard, and emotionally broken. At one point, I found myself homeless, separated from one of my children during a traumatic divorce and navigating a painful legal process that questioned everything I knew about myself as a mother. The stress and grief were overwhelming. I felt like I was disappearing under the weight of it all. Slowly suffocating without her.
One day, during that painful time, I was watching animal videos—something that often brought me a moment of calm. I came across a video of a mother cow, frantic and grieving as her baby was taken from her by a farmer. The cries coming from her were devastating—raw, terrified, and deeply familiar. In that moment, it hit me: I knew that pain. I knew what it felt like to have your child taken from you. I knew what it felt like to scream and not be heard. That mother and I were not so different.
But here’s the part that haunts me— My story didn’t end the way hers did.
Eventually, I was reunited with my daughter. I got to hold her again. To hear her voice. To rebuild the year that was lost do to others not hearing my screams.
That mother cow never did. Her baby was taken. And then she was used again. And again. Until her body gave out and eventually she was sent to slaughter.
That was the moment everything shifted. I couldn’t unsee what I saw, and I couldn’t unknow what I now understood. I made the decision that day to stop contributing to the suffering of animals—and I’ve never looked back.
Going vegan wasn’t just about changing what I ate—it was about honoring the compassion that had always lived inside me. It was about healing. It was about choosing not to cause the kind of pain I knew far too well.
As a woman, this connection goes even deeper. I know what it feels like to have your body used without your consent. To be hurt, touched, dismissed, and silenced. I know what it’s like to have your pain minimized and your voice taken. Factory farming doesn’t just exploit animals—it mirrors systems of abuse that many women have experienced. When I saw what these females alone endure—forced breeding, separation from their babies, the use of their bodies until they collapse—I didn’t just see cruelty. I saw something painfully familiar.
I may never be able to change the past, but I can choose how I move forward. And I choose empathy. I choose to live in a way that causes the least harm to others—human and nonhuman alike.
If you’ve ever felt that quiet discomfort when learning where your food comes from—or if my story touches something in you—don’t look away. Watch the footage. Ask the questions. Visit a sanctuary.
Sit with the discomfort, and let it transform you. Because when we allow ourselves to truly feel the pain of others, we begin to understand the power we have to stop it. And if our pain can open us to the pain of others, isn’t that where healing begins—for all of us?
Ashely
