Flexitarian? Vegetarian?

I have issues with meat.

Yep… I’ve always been super picky about my meat. If I even saw a vein or anything resembling blood I couldn’t eat it. If I bit down and it crunched when it wasn’t supposed to I couldn’t eat it. If it’s slightly pink (as in red meat), I couldn’t eat it. One time I actually was visiting a friends house and her grandparents made me a burger. I bit into it and proclaimed “It’s BLEEDING!” I know.. it was not the politest thing for me to say, but I couldn’t help it.

As a result, I never eat red meat at restaurants, I stopped eating steak a few years ago (I’ve probably had a few bites here and there, but never liked it).  I always say I like hamburgers, but when it comes time to eat them I take a few bites, throw out the meat, and eat the bread.   The same goes for hot dogs.  I recently bought The Great Organic Uncured Hot Dog. It tasted pretty good and I felt better knowing it didn’t have any bad parts of the animal in it. Am I weird?

In all reality, the only meat I actually have liked is chicken, cold cut turkey breast, turkey on Thanksgiving, ham on Christmas (you know..the spiral kind), and I think that might be it. BUT, lately I have had issues with chicken and cold cut turkey breast. Let’s start out with the chicken. I watched Food Inc. Is that enough said? No? Okay.. so it grosses me out that the animals live in such bad conditions. It grosses me out even more when I heard out beef is cleaned with ammonia. It makes me think, what is the chicken cleaned with? I feel like there is so much that I don’t know about this topic. Secondly, cold cut turkey breast. When it is cut thin it looks harmless. But I have been told it’s a processed meat product and it makes me wonder what else is in there. The idea all started when my friend found out she could not have gluten. She said even cold cut have gluten in them. I had no idea! I didn’t realize gluten is like a glu… used to hold things together. (Also pardon me if I am wrong with any of this information..this is what I have been told and it might not all be accurate).

I do feel better when I get free range, vegetarian fed chicken. Is that what it is? I’m still learning. In my words, I like when the chickens are allowed to roam free and are given the proper food and care. I just feel like it is so easy to stick a sticker saying something on a package of chicken and we are forced to believe it because we can’t control it.

So all of this leads me to ask myself what do I consider myself? I eat yogurt and cheese. I have been grossed out by eggs, but am still making myself eat them from time to time.

I am just confused. I wish I could just give up meat products, but I do realize they are everywhere. If you are vegan or vegetarian how do you do it?

I realize I have been slowly cutting meat out without doing it intentionally. Maybe that’s why it’s working for me. I’m not putting pressure on myself to cut it out, but I am more grossed out by it and just can’t stomach it.

Let me know what you think about all of this and your views on meat. I’d love to hear from you guys!