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Veganuary 2026: Julia's Vegan Journey (Originally released 2025)
67 Plays4 days ago
This January we are re-releasing all eighteen of our 'Going Vegan' series, to shine a spotlight on the huge variety of everyday normal folk who choose to avoid animal expoitation through choosing a vegan lifestyle.
In today's rerun, we hear from the fabulous Julia!
For the original shownotes for this episode, visit Episode 132 directly https://zencastr.com/z/SVJXddJH
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Enough of the Falafel is a community of people who love keeping on top of the latest news in the world of veganism & animal rights. With our podcasts, we aim to keep listeners (& ourselves) informed & up-to-date with the latest developments that affect vegans & non-human animals; giving insight, whilst staying balanced; remaining true to our vegan ethics, whilst constantly seeking to grow & develop.
Each week we look through news stories from the past 7 days in the world of veganism & animal rights, as well as picking a 'timeless' vegan or animal rights issue, and discussing it in more depth.
If you spot any news stories that might catch our fancy, or have an idea for a discussion topic, get in touch via enoughofthefalafel@gmail.com.
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Thanks everyone for listening; give us a rating and drop us a message to say "hi"; it'll make our day!
Julia & Ant
Recommended
Transcript
Introduction to Veganuary 2026
00:00:01
Speaker
Hi there, this is Anthony from the Enough of the Falafel Collective. We're a group of just everyday vegans who for the last two and a half years or so have been releasing two podcasts a week bringing you vegan and animal rights news as well as philosophical discussions. And many of the contributors on the show have released a special episode in the past where they've talked about their journey of going vegan. And for Veganuary 2026, we are re-releasing all of those episodes and the episode you're about to listen to now is one of those so it's been recorded at some point in the last three years and it features one of our contributors we really hope you enjoy it and that you continue to join for other episodes that we release over the course of 2026
00:00:50
Speaker
Julia, thank you so much for your time
Julia's Early Signs of Veganism
00:00:52
Speaker
today. Really, really grateful that you've you've given us this time to learn about you and your your vegan journey. And we've we've met a matter of minutes ago, so I'm going to be learning things exactly the same pace as all of our listeners out there, which is really exciting for me. What I'm going to ask you to do to start with is um almost pretend you're a bit of ah a forensic detective and and think how far back can you go to to seek out those first signs that maybe somewhere in there, there's a potential vegan one day in your in your life. How far back do you think you could go? i
Childhood Trauma Leading to Vegetarianism
00:01:31
Speaker
think I was about six years.
00:01:33
Speaker
And I'm 69 now, so we're going back a long time. and My family were all animal lovers, as they call themselves, and we were living in Poland and I was in a yard playing with some chickens. We'd gone to some people's house for lunch and I was in the yard playing with some chickens. And while I was playing with them, I accidentally dropped one of them and it limped around for a bit.
00:01:59
Speaker
And then somebody came rushing out of the house scooped it up, killed it. Just like that. My friend, I was playing with them. I was playing with them. And I was so upset and distraught. I can remember this all these years on. And then we went in for lunch and my parents calmed me down to the thing. And that was lunch.
00:02:20
Speaker
Oh my goodness. so We were going to kill one anyway, but because you dropped one and it broke its leg or something, that was the one we we had. and i've read And from that day, I never ever ate meat again. Wow, my goodness. the fair work There it was, right in front of the six-year-old eyes. Yes. I mean, I'm sure that they were a peasant family living um on the Polish borders in the nineteen fifty s So it's nothing like it was now. And I'm sure that chicken had a better life than animals do now. But it still brought back the reality that it was a living thing that I'd been enjoying the company of.
00:02:59
Speaker
And then it was me just on my plate for dinner. Gosh. Awful, awful. What a stark experience. Goodness. And so that was it from then? That was it from then when I was six. And the rest of my family didn't eat meat either.
00:03:15
Speaker
Because in that environment, if you wanted to eat meat, you did go to the market and buy live chicken and bring it home and do the business and do it. My mother could
Transition to Veganism and Activism
00:03:24
Speaker
never do that. So we never really had it.
00:03:28
Speaker
and But when we came back to England when I was about 13 and she could go in the supermarkets and get it, they went back on to eating meat and I never did. But we used to have milk and it was quite a strange childhood and we used to run out to lady used to come out on a bike. with a big milk churn and we used to run out with whatever container we had and then she'd fill it up and we'd take it in the house and that was it. It was nothing like the dairy farming practices of these days.
00:03:54
Speaker
so And that was fine. So I was vegetarian, I suppose, then but until I came back. to England, was 13 and then I wasn't eating meat but my experience of milk then was horrific because you're too young to remember but in those days we had milk at school and it would always be sour or you'd have frozen and you'd put it next to the radiators to thaw it out or something. And it tasted absolutely vile.
00:04:21
Speaker
And so I was just never like that from the age of about 13. But I still wasn't really what I would call um vegan because I was eating things like cakes and sweets and... um all the other things that sort of go. in it was And for many years, I was just in that state of being vegetarian. I was going to became an animal activist in my late teens, early 20s, and I was going down to the ports at Dover to stop trucks and going to the continent and things like that.
Challenges of Early Activism
00:04:51
Speaker
But I was only vegetarian. I thought that was everything. you know I thought I was doing enough. And it was probably about 15 years later, about 30 years ago, when I actually realised that
00:05:04
Speaker
It wasn't enough and that I had to make that change to go vegan. But by that time I was really only eating the eggs from... um We had some rescue hens and I was eating their eggs. So when they kind of died, they were about 11, 12 years old by the time they died.
00:05:19
Speaker
After that, I would say I was vegan. And I just potted along like that, doing a lot of animal activism and everything, which introduced me to other like-minded people, and I got a lot of support.
Family Dynamics and Veganism
00:05:33
Speaker
It's very difficult to be a vegan when you're on your own.
00:05:36
Speaker
ah it was in those days, less so now, because there really wasn't anything in the shops to buy. i was making my own almond milk, my own cheese, my own everything. But nowadays you can go to any shop and buy anything vegan, really. I've just come back from a vegan cruise and they'd even veganised those little Portuguese custard tarts that they're so famous for.
00:05:59
Speaker
They had vegan versions of that. So really you can veganise anything. Can I ask, Julia, do it's it sounds like and in your childhood childhood, particularly, on on the one hand, there's there's you know a very stark example there of um ah you know of an animal's life being ended. um But then you've also described like your family not necessarily being in the custom of of eating meat when when you're in Poland. like In a sense, that's that is a is that do you think that was arguably an easier environment to to forego meat than than if everyone around you is consuming it?
00:06:37
Speaker
No, parents made it very difficult for me. Oh, really? Yes. They thought I wasn't, because when you went out to eat vegan or vegetarian in those days, it really was just chips or a plate of salad with nothing on it. Yes. There wasn't the choices in the restaurants there are all now, and my mother was worried that I would make myself ill.
00:06:58
Speaker
Right. Yeah, yeah. There was a lack of knowledge in the 50s and 60s, which, you know, anybody can tap into any information they want now and get the knowledge for nutrition. Which I think is quite ah a common experience of people going... I mean, I've got such admiration for anybody who... who becomes vegetarian or vegan as as a child, because typically people are doing so in households where that's unusual. But yeah, I was just referencing the that that the comment you've made about your your family sometimes not eating meat and wondered if that made any any difference. No, I think they understood it.
00:07:34
Speaker
because they'd seen what I'd seen, but they kind of put it out of their minds and sort of moved on, because they're just a generation, I suppose, I don't know. My young little sister was too young to remember, um so it was just my mother and father. As I say, they would the biggest animal lovers are going until it came to putting food on your plate.
00:07:55
Speaker
which was, you quite common, isn't it? Quite common. I'm interested, you you you mentioned there going to do um activism at, again, a relatively young age. How how did you find find out about those things and and what were they like when
Connecting with Vegans Pre-Internet
00:08:10
Speaker
experienced it? Well, because there no text messages. We had to ring people on landlines and send letters in the post.
00:08:17
Speaker
But I did find like-minded people. It wasn't easy, but we all got together and it was a great support group for each other. and would just just will do it once month. We did it for a couple of years and there there wasn't all the animal rights marches and all the things there are today. I mean, it's so easy these days.
00:08:38
Speaker
There's much understanding, so much awareness. It's so easy to connect to people. how How did you find out about it? Was it just like an ad in a news agent or something? or No, it was in um ah there was a magazine called Vegetarian.
00:08:51
Speaker
And there would be sort of backstreet health shops that you could wrinkle out. it wasn't There wasn't Holland and Barrett chains or anything like that. If you went up a back alley somewhere, there might be a little health spot that sold lentils. And there would be a little notice board or something in there.
00:09:06
Speaker
ah as As you've referenced, I've sort of come to things a bit more recently than that. But, i you know, i I do still remember when you would have to seek out vegan food quite specifically. And actually, looking back now, it it is quite exciting and adventurous, really. You know, I almost missed that a little bit.
00:09:24
Speaker
Well, yes. yes and And there was, um, Frank's was the restaurant in London. It was the only one and Sarah Brown's cookbook. And they were really the only things of reference that I had. Yeah, yeah. It's and it's incredible, really, isn't it? and You've mentioned that um you sort of got to a point where you you felt like you needed to do more or you you you thought that you were doing enough by the animals, but you you sort realised or felt that you needed to do more. Where
Insight into the Dairy Industry
00:09:53
Speaker
where did that come from, do you think? I went out with a dairy farmer. That'd do it.
00:10:02
Speaker
Yeah. And without realising what he was doing, um i went behind the scenes of a large dairy farm in Cheshire.
00:10:13
Speaker
it was a poem It didn't last very long. the relationship quickly heated out. And yeah, I hadn't realised... I had not realised, you know, I was probably about 37, 38 at the time, maybe a bit more. I just hadn't realised. The cruelty in the dairy industry and the the suffering of the animals goes on for such a long time, for years, for those cows.
00:10:36
Speaker
um Whereas in the meat industry, I think it's over and done with fairly shortly. But um it was such an eye-opener. Yeah, gosh. And and was that it just overnight then? Well, I'd already really given up, because I didn't like it. But it would be in things that I'd bought from the shops when was eating. I wasn't putting it in my tea or coffee or drinking it.
00:10:56
Speaker
it was sort of there, but it wasn't really visible. But no, i then that's when I think that's when I probably started reading labels a bit more. reading the ingredients to make darn sure I wasn't getting any of it and then of course all the things our milk but they're not called milk yeah yeah absolutely and just just for context um is my maths right in thinking that that would have been in the
00:11:20
Speaker
Yes. And so how how was that sort of making that transition then just just practically, but also, I guess, emotionally, socially? Well, I was married to somebody who was a vegetarian as well. That marriage sadly broke up. I had twins and and they became vegan with me. and They are both now very strict vegans.
00:11:42
Speaker
So, yes, it was ah it was a learning curve and it was difficult. It was probably was quite difficult for my children being young and at school. But um we did it. um I cooked a lot anyway of my own food and tried to eat healthily. So, yeah, we we did it. But socially...
00:12:00
Speaker
It wasn't easy. There still wasn't food on menus. And you go to people's houses and they'd say, you can't eat that, can you? And you can't take have this. And I'm like, well, I can, but I choose not to. That's particularly infuriating. Well, I i find it like that too. Like it's been sort of referenced like some sort of disability or something like that. Yes. Like it's an allergy or something. Yeah.
00:12:24
Speaker
Do you think that, um you know, you've you've obviously avoided meat from a very young age, you you know, basically your whole life? did Did that sort of almost help with the vegan transition for from a, I don't know, from a social point of view, you're used to being a little different? i do Because I don't really know what I'm missing, do I? No. No, I don't miss it at all. And I feel so much, I feel so well. You know, I'm so active.
00:12:52
Speaker
And I look at my children and I think they're fit and active young, I mean, they're 33 now. um They are as well. And I think I've done the best I can bringing them up healthily. Yeah, fantastic fantastic fantastic to to have examples of people who've been been vegan all all that time. And always said, oh, you can't do that to your children. And, you know, well, I wasn't doing anything to them. when they Once they got sort of aware and into their late, what do you it, childhood years and into their teens, they were free to choose. I couldn't control what they were eating when they were out of the house. Yeah. Can I ask, Julie, were there things when you've obviously got ah an ethical motivation to to make like this this lifestyle change, whether whether it becoming initially vegetarian or or then subsequently vegan? That's the motivation. But nonetheless, we can still have foreboding and and fears and worries and reservations about living life in ah in a different way to the way we have been. Like what what what hesitations did you have or or concerns? i know I know it's easy to dismiss them now with with hindsight, but that I'm sure they will have been there. I hated going out and being the only vegan.
00:14:08
Speaker
That made me a bit self-conscious. trying to think, goodness, I can't think. i don't think I had any worry. I just wanted to scream at other people, really. I would call myself an angry vegan. Whereas my husband, who's also vegan, he's a much calmer vegan. um Because by that time, I'd finished doing the activism.
00:14:27
Speaker
I did go back to it in later years, but I was volunteering at animal sanctuaries. So I was, and I had my own animals and rescued horses and dogs and things. So it was always, the animals always the uppermost in my thoughts.
00:14:42
Speaker
And, you know, I could no more sort sit down and eat a baby kitten than I could a baby lamb. So it was always for the animals. and
Health and Social Acceptance
00:14:50
Speaker
i I did feel, was I missing out on anything? But I don't think I was, because i think I got so much from it. In in in terms of?
00:14:58
Speaker
i Well, i felt peace in my body. And I felt happy with my choice, that my lifestyle choices. I felt, I do still feel very content about it. And whatever I was missing would not have made up for that.
00:15:11
Speaker
which is something that you can often not realise is a thing that you could feel until you have felt it. You you know you look around you and you see people who are so sort of sick and you think, please change your diet, you would feel so much better. Yes, and well and and like you say, that that that' sort of um ethical and moral choice element of things too, I think, and and until you've made conscious decisions to change to live your life in that way, guided by those ethics or morals. I wonder to what extent you can understand what it's like to live your life in that way and and how satisfying that can feel at times. No, I do feel very... And now we moved here about six years ago.
00:15:55
Speaker
And although saying, oh, I'm vegan, I'm vegan, it wasn't until we moved here that I actually removed all animal products from the house. Leather, silk, wool, that's all gone.
00:16:06
Speaker
So it's taken that number of years to get to the that point. Well, there's a big part of education involved as well, isn't it? And self-development there. And sometimes you just don't realise things. It might not be a conscious choice to continue wearing woolly socks or whatever. You might not have thought about it. Exactly. Well, I think it's bit like being vegetarian. I thought, well, that's enough. I'm vegetarian. I'm doing everything possible for the animals. Actually, I wasn't. So I was thinking, well, vegan, but I was wearing leather shoes and things. So actually, what was I doing? that's changed now.
00:16:42
Speaker
I've got it a plant-based vi diet and a vegan lifestyle, but I just feel so much better in my health and there's a good karma and I think there's a nice feeling in this house because there's no evidence of suffering.
00:16:55
Speaker
know i Because I think when you're eating meat, you're getting the fear and the anguish. in with you as well and the hormones that you're consuming as well as all the chemical drugs and things and there just isn't any of that I mean you know if we eat by colour and by appearance and a lovely bowl of colourful salad and vegetables so much more appetising than a bit of grey meat isn't it really on the plate and I mean people say well make a salad but have you ever seen a salad a vegan made yeah it's just bursting with colour isn't it yes
00:17:27
Speaker
Yeah, absolutely. possibly Possibly in reaction to that misconception that, you know, all we eat are lettuce leaves and what have you. But in terms of ah like practical things that have have really helped you, because I mean, you're you're an expert at this now, you've been doing this for decades, um often often at times where, I mean, it's it's still, I would challenge anyone that says that it's completely easy to be vegan now, because i I think, you know, that the rest of the world is not. So I think the
Traveling and Cooking as a Vegan
00:17:56
Speaker
challenges are still there. But I mean, you you were doing it when it was really, really not easy. What what would be your top tips then to to kind of do this in a way that's successful and sustainable for you as an individual? Well, it's really interesting when you're travelling to seek out vegan food. you you get yourself into a lot of places and when you're abroad that you probably wouldn't have otherwise got to if you just went into the first restaurant you came across.
00:18:22
Speaker
And also to keep being open-minded and keep trying new things and new ways of cooking things. I've just discovered jarred chickpeas after all these years. And just spoon them out of the jar, they're so delicious. I've been using tin chickpeas for years. What was I missing there?
00:18:38
Speaker
And just keep it trying new foods and being open to new ways of cooking. And, you know, it's the same food, but you can do so much more with it now. We've all got air fries and rice cookers and You can just do delicious things and it's not expensive and it's not difficult. It's quite quick. And it's because the point, is I think, really one of the loveliest things, it's all fruit and vegetables and it's all fresh.
00:19:02
Speaker
And it's it's just so nice and healthy. And I've always got stuff in the fridge. When you open my fridge, you even my fridge looks colourful.
00:19:12
Speaker
Yes, a lovely thing. A lovely thing. what What do you think has been the biggest surprise for you? You've you've touched on a few things that that perhaps you weren't expecting, but what's what what surprised you?
Influence on Partner's Veganism
00:19:25
Speaker
that My husband agreed to go vegan. Was that hard work? No, because I was widowed previously and my previous husband was vegan as well.
00:19:35
Speaker
And then when I met the present husband on our second date, I said, if you're not going to go vegan, there's not going to be anything. coming from it and he went vegan that was seven years ago and he still is that was a big surprise that was a big surprise actually yeah and now my joy is in meeting you know everywhere you go you bump into a vegan there's all I was always it was always me was the only one in the restaurant or the only one in a group and and now there's usually three or four of us at least maybe more sometimes um and there are things on most menus in most restaurants there's something you can have
00:20:13
Speaker
it's it's ah it's It's something that's that's hard to explain to people, i think. you know we we touched on you know difficulties historically and in in being able to get certain foods from from certain places. But yeah, that whole thing about going through years and years of of of never meeting people another person who calls themselves this same word. that's That's completely foreign, I think, to to a lot of, probably to a lot of our listeners now.
From Isolation to Community
00:20:41
Speaker
But it's it was a real thing, wasn't it? It was. It absolutely was. Yes. you really You really do think you were the only one in the world, didn't you? But nowadays, because you've got Facebook and Instagram and all these, you can very easily find other vegans in your area.
00:20:58
Speaker
There are lots of meet-up and things going on. It's not hard finding them these days. But you're right, in the days you'd sort of trot up and down the streets, wouldn't you, lurking if you saw a vegan cafe or something and tried to pluck up courage to go in in case they were all sort of and then expecting a plate of lentils and brown rice. And it's just changed so much.
00:21:20
Speaker
Well, you you you referenced cranks. I think that the name was ironic, wasn't it? but but I think it it it was it was sort of saying, oh, you all think that we're cranks. And that's why they called it Frankie, yes. It the first one that I remember. There might have been others in other parts of the country, but that was the first one in London. Yeah, it definitely got a lot of um lot of press coverage I've been made aware of. yet um And when we're talking about generational differences now on on what it's like to be vegan. if If we could sort of hypothetically imagine for you, Julia, but let's let's say you've had your eyes opened to to the dairy industry, but that's that's taken place now, you know, end of 2024, start of 2025. What do you think a vegan journey and a vegan transition would look like for you now? Is it as straightforward as saying, oh, it'd just be much easier or would some of the be harder?
00:22:17
Speaker
I think people don't like to change. People
Resistance to Change
00:22:21
Speaker
get very set in their ways and there's quite a lot of resistance to change. But people can change. and I use the sort of wearing seatbelts analogy and the smoking thing, you know, people can make changes, especially when their health is on the line. People can make changes.
00:22:36
Speaker
um I think it's easy to get information now, but what you do with it might not be easier. I mean, because we're all in bit of self-denial, aren't we? You still get people saying, where do you get your vitamins from and everything like that, but...
00:22:51
Speaker
isn't at all relevant nowadays but people still ask what do you eat well i didn't get this size on a lettuce leaf But I think the vegan journey now and the transition would be fairly simple once you've made the decision.
00:23:07
Speaker
but And then if you lapse, don't beat yourself up because when you're out with friends and people, it is difficult if you're the only one in the group. And, you know, it's your food that comes last. However, I can say when you're on an aeroplane, you always get served first. LAUGHTER They always bring the special diets out first, so you get rid of it. it's ah just think of the reason. I mean, if you're doing it for the compassion to the animals, then just keep that in your mind. If you're doing it for your health, you'll soon start to feel so much better. You won't want to go back to those other ways. And if you're doing it for the climate, just look around you and see what damage we're doing. Yeah, keeping keeping that cornerstone of of of motivation together.
00:23:52
Speaker
Yeah, keep your motivation there. I mean, I have some words written in my diary. So sometimes I still sometimes think, oh, I'd like to do that. And then I realise there's something unethical about it. So I don't do it And people say, oh, go on. It's only a bit of cheese. or it's only And I just have to come back and remote remind myself why I'm doing it entertainment for me but it's the life of an animal so it's not really entertainment is it yeah absolutely that that perspective is so so important isn't it it is there anything you know if you could go go back to the start of your vegan journey um is it is there anything that that you would have done differently or or might have approached in in in a different manner do you think sometimes i regret being quite hard on my parents
00:24:41
Speaker
for not following me on my journey.
Generational Differences in Veganism
00:24:44
Speaker
i gave them quite a hard time as a teenager and into my later life as well. I perhaps should have been a bit gentler on them.
00:24:52
Speaker
Maybe they were, I don't know. I don't know. but it's It's really hard that though, isn't it? It's it's really difficult but because when you feel you share something so fundamental as, as you know, ah a romantic partner or a friend or a family member, the the pain of them them sort of doing the opposite to you and in in a sense with regards to something so important it's that's that's really really vivid isn't it you know they came from the war years and foods were short and you had to eat what you were given and all this well we we don't have that we have lots of food available to us and lots of choices and i mean for me my vegan day starts when i wake up it's the toothpaste i use on my toothbrush it's the what i have on my plate for breakfast um
00:25:40
Speaker
what I wash my face in it's it's, for me, this is all my vegan day. second nature to me now it hasn't always been second nature that's that's why i think like you say um for forgiving yourself for for mistakes or lapses is is really important because actually in in the long run habits that become entrenched in in in a positive way that they're what are going to make the the biggest difference i think right rather than picking on things when when they don't go right Yes, don't beat yourself up. if Because the definition of veganism is to do the best you can, isn't it? As Donald Watson's word, to be the best you can. And that doesn't mean being perfect, just the best you can be. Absolutely. I feel like we're we're rounding nicely towards the last question that I that i had down to to ask you any anyway, Julia. But
Encouragement for New Vegans
00:26:33
Speaker
what... What would you say to somebody now who is, let's say they're that they're doing Veganuary in 2025. It's the first time that they've they've thought, right, i'd I'd like to give this vegan lifestyle a go. What would you say to them?
00:26:46
Speaker
Come on to my house and I'll cook you to a meal so delicious you won't want to ever eat meat again.
00:26:54
Speaker
that's that's perfect that's perfect i mean if if if you now have a perpetual queue because you know the nature of these nature of these podcasts is that yes no i would say stick with it because you've taken the first big step by doing veganuary mean you know you've taken that first step sometimes the hardest thing is to take the first step and if you're doing veganuary you've taken that first step and the second and third probably so you're on the way you've left the starting gates well done fantastic julia it's been so lovely talking to you and and hearing about your journey and um my goodness there's there's so many unique thinking points there so thank you so much for that it's been brilliant you're very welcome thank you
00:27:40
Speaker
This has been an Enough of the Falafel production. We're just
Closing and Resources
00:27:44
Speaker
a normal bunch of everyday vegans putting our voices out there. The show is hosted by Zencaster. We use music and special effects by zapsflat.com.
00:27:55
Speaker
And sometimes, if you're lucky, at the end of an episode, you'll hear a poem by Mr Dominic Berry. Thanks all for listening, and see you next time.
00:28:21
Speaker
This episode may have come to an end, but did you know we've got a whole archive containing all our shows dating back to September 2023? twenty twenty three That is right, Dominic. There's over 100 episodes on there featuring our brilliant range of different guests, people's stories of going vegan, philosophical debates, moral quandaries, and of course...
00:28:42
Speaker
around a dozen news items from around the world each week. So check back on your podcast player to hear previous episodes. And remember to get an alert for each new episode, simply click like or follow and also subscribe to the show.
00:28:57
Speaker
Thanks for your ongoing support wherever you listen to us from.