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Healthy Home Economist / Archives / Healthy Living / Why Do the Vast Majority of Vegetarians Return to Meat?

Why Do the Vast Majority of Vegetarians Return to Meat?

by Sarah Pope / Updated: Jun 20, 2025 / Affiliate Links ✔

Table of Contents[Hide][Show]
  • Sustainable Meat Proves Enticing
  • Is Meat Consumption “In Our Genes”?
  • Vegetarian Cultures Compared to Omnivores

Why the vast majority of vegetarians return to eating meat within a few years. Is eating meat, in fact, “in our genes”?

vegetarian woman with ill health from nutritional deficiencies

For the vast majority of vegetarians, abstaining from meat is only a phase rather than a permanent life choice.

According to Psychology Today, roughly 75% of vegetarians eventually return to eating meat with 9 years being the average length of time of abstinence. (1)

The most common reason former vegetarians cited as the reason they returned to meat was declining health.

One vegetarian turned omnivore put it very succinctly:

I’ll take a dead cow over anemia any time.

Other former vegetarians cited persistent physical weakness despite eating a whole foods plant-based diet while others returned to meat at the recommendation of their doctor.

Another big reason that vegetarians returned to meat was due to irresistible cravings. This occurred even among long-term vegetarians. 

Respondents talked about their protein cravings or how the smell of cooking bacon drove them crazy.

One survey participant wrote:

I just felt hungry all the time and that hunger would not be satisfied unless I ate meat.

Another put it more humorously:

Starving college student + First night back home with the folks + Fifty or so blazin’ buffalo wings waiting in the kitchen = Surrender.

My late Father-In-Law, who ate primarily vegetarian, used to say that he would experience periodic (overwhelming) cravings for steak. He wisely chose to indulge himself during those episodes, thinking that there was a nutritional deficiency that was causing the cravings.

Even the hugely popular Netflix documentary What The Health was unable to name a single vegan population group that was successful staying healthy and fertile over the long term!

Sustainable Meat Proves Enticing

About half of vegetarians originally gave up meat for ethical reasons.

Pictures of confined animals standing on concrete in their own excrement and the stench of factory farms on country roads from 5 miles away are no doubt good reasons to turn away from meat.  

Some former vegetarians, however, have recognized and embraced the grassfed movement, finding their way back to sustainable and humanely raised, cruelty-free meats as a real ethical alternative.

Some of these converts view buying grassfed beef and other sustainably raised animal foods as a new form of activism similar to their boycott of factory-farmed meats when they were vegetarians.

Berlin Reed, a long-term vegetarian with the tattoo “vegan” on his neck is one of these. (2)

Now known as “the ethical butcher”, he believes that promoting customer contact with butchers which has been lost in recent decades with the rise of factory farming is the key to an improved and sustainable meat system.

Is Meat Consumption “In Our Genes”?

The article in Psychology Today ends on a baffled note, with the author wondering if meat eating could potentially be in our genes? (3)

That’s an easy question.

Of course it is!

Just look at our omnivore teeth, which include four pointy canines (for tearing meat!).

I submit that the results of the Psychology Today survey, which found most vegetarians ditching plant-based eating within a few years, are not surprising.

In fact, they are a strong testament to the research of Dr. Weston A. Price.

Dr. Price traveled the world early in the last century, living amongst and intensely studying 14 isolated cultures.

During this adventure, he documented these isolated people groups consuming their ancestral diet in great detail.

Amazing pictures and the data from his analysis of these foods can be found in his masterpiece, Nutrition and Physical Degeneration.

If you’ve ever considered becoming a vegetarian, I highly recommend this book. It will dissuade you in a hurry!

Dr. Price concluded that while the diets of these natives varied widely, nutrient-dense animal foods high in the fat-soluble true vitamin A, D, and K2 (also known as Activator X) were the common denominators.

Consumption of these animal foods was revered in these communities as they bestowed vibrant health, easy fertility, healthy children, and high resistance to chronic and infectious diseases.

Vegetarian Cultures Compared to Omnivores

The discovery by Dr. Price that there wasn’t a single vegetarian indigenous culture that had the vibrant health of those consuming animal foods was actually a disappointment to him!

Dr. Price had expected to find the vegetarian cultures to be the healthiest cultures of all.

This was due to the vegetarians of his day in the 1920s and 1930s being healthier than Americans eating a processed diet.

However, the ancestral vegetarian cultures he examined displayed far more degeneration and tooth decay than the omnivore cultures.

Dr. Price’s observation that vegetarians suffered from more cavities has been confirmed by peer-reviewed research in recent years.

Besides issues with caries, vegetarians also suffer from a high risk of fractures compared to the general population that consumes meat.

Dr. Price’s scientific integrity demanded recognition of the fact that the health of the indigenous omnivores far exceeded that of the vegetarian societies.

Those consuming a wide variety of marine seafood exhibited the most vibrancy of all.

Therefore, in the famous words of Pink Floyd, “Eat yer meat!”

And….crickets and other mass-produced bugs don’t count as a sustainable meat option, despite what mainstream media claims! Eating factory-farmed bugs is more likely to give you parasites than nourishment! (4)

Ancestrally-inspired meat eaters hate factory farms whether it be for animals or insects!

References

(1, 3) Psychology Today

(2) Beating a Humane Retreat Back to Meat

(4) The Risks of Eating Commercially-farmed Insects

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Category: Healthy Living
Sarah Pope

Sarah Pope MGA has been a Health and Nutrition Educator since 2002. She is a summa cum laude graduate in Economics from Furman University and holds a Master’s degree from the University of Pennsylvania.

She is the author of three books: Amazon #1 bestseller Get Your Fats Straight, Traditional Remedies for Modern Families, and Living Green in an Artificial World.

Her four eBooks Good Diet…Bad Diet, Real Food Fermentation, Ketonomics, and Ancestrally Inspired Dairy-Free Recipes are available for complimentary download via Healthy Home Plus.

Her mission is dedicated to helping families effectively incorporate the principles of ancestral diets within the modern household. She is a sought after lecturer around the world for conferences, summits, and podcasts.

Sarah was awarded Activist of the Year in 2010 at the International Wise Traditions Conference, subsequently serving on the Board of Directors of the nutrition nonprofit the Weston A. Price Foundation for seven years.

Her work has been covered by numerous independent and major media including USA Today, ABC, and NBC among many others.

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Reader Interactions

Comments (132)

  1. candace

    Dec 4, 2011 at 2:21 pm

    I am an omnivore, but more importantly, I am a locavore. I have not seen any comments here that address the fact that vegans and probably most vegetarians are surely supporting big ag, petrochemical fertilizers, & mass transportation of their varied culinary choices. I eat fruits and veggies when they are fresh and in season, or I preserve. I eat local meats, dairy, and eggs. I do not shop at the grocery store. I will not prop up large, monocrop farms (even organic ones) that destroy soil fertility, ecosystems, and kill more small mammals than a local, small farm does.
    I garden organically and manually kill hundreds of bugs each year in order to do so (no way around it). I milk goats and harvest few “kids” a year and maybe some venison and raise laying hens. I believe that living in this way is gentler on the earth- we are actually building topsoil here- and is a truly sustainable system. Massive monocrop farming, dependent on petrol-think corn, soy, & wheat- is destroying topsoil at an alarming rate. Just because you don’t see the blood of small mammals on your out of state lettuce does not mean it isn’t there (metaphorically speaking).
    And if we stop eating and milking cows, what will become of them? keep them for pets? anyone who thinks that probably hasn’t mucked a barn or hauled water in the dead of winter.

    Reply
  2. Heather

    Nov 15, 2011 at 9:51 pm

    I was vegetarian for six year before returning to meat last December (2010) when I found out I was pregnant with my daughter Willow. Best choose I ever made.

    Reply
  3. Saab

    Nov 11, 2011 at 4:18 am

    Been a vegetarian for quite some time now, and I don’t drool when I see cuts of meat laid out on a grocery store counter, or when I see a dead animal on the floor. Also, my taste buds don’t have taste for amino acids, only carbohydrates. Also, I think vegetarians living in impoverished villages will undoubtedly be more malnourished than the average meat-eater that can afford to eat it. Also, I found something interesting that I thought I wanted to share with all of you whether you’re meat-eater or vegetarian: http://www.drmcdougall.com/misc/2005nl/august/050800fav5.htm

    No thanks, I’ll have the cilantro please.

    Reply
  4. Dsm

    Oct 15, 2011 at 7:41 am

    Kosher slaughtering lying jew.

    Reply
    • Dsm

      Oct 15, 2011 at 7:56 am

      “I’ll take a dead cow over anemia any time.”

      Perfect jew phrase. .

  5. Me

    Sep 30, 2011 at 6:52 am

    My mom has been vegetarian for approximately 35 years. She has made it her business to do her own research in terms of what, how much, when, etc. to eat to maintain optimum health. So far, so good.

    I also have an aunt who has been vegetarian for at least 25 years. She’s thriving as well.

    I agree with Paul. There are as many variables as there are people and eating meat may or may not be a good choice, for as many reasons.

    Vegetarian… Meat eater…

    More important for me is eating fresh organic food, drinking clean water, breathing clean air, and getting enough sleep. 🙂

    Reply
  6. Dennis A. Reid (@DennisAReid)

    Sep 25, 2011 at 3:45 pm

    Most Vegetarians Return to Eating Meat – The Healthy Home Economist http://t.co/jI1PXua6

    Reply
  7. JJ

    Sep 23, 2011 at 4:00 pm

    I am a little skeptical about this article. I was raised as a vegetarian and never experienced any protein cravings or poor health. My parents have both been vegetarians for 50 years and they are in excellent health and look to be in their 50’s instead of nearing their 70’s. In addition I have many many friends and family members that have been vegetarians for decades or even their entire lives. Many of the older people in my community enjoy excellent health into their 80’s and 90’s.
    Also I wonder about a study that showed that Seventh-day Adventists, who have a vegetarian culture, are the longest lived people on the earth?

    Reply
  8. April

    Sep 20, 2011 at 4:25 pm

    Interesting article–however, I never read many posts about people who have been raised vegetarian. I am 30 years old, vegetarian for life. Never had a health issue besides the flu–same goes for my siblings. My parents are 60 and they look 40- both vegetarians since the age of 20. Now it may just be good genetics, but this type of living has not done me wrong yet. I respect cultures for eating meat, but I have no respect for people turning a blind eye to the awful abuses that factory farmed animals are subjected to every day and the harm that it does to our earth (number #1 cause of deforestation and groundwater pollution). I respect people who raise their own meat, slaughter, and prepare it as our ancestors did, but the reality is that most people in our country (USA) don’t do that. I believe that at one time, eating meat was necessary, but not anymore. I’ve tried steak, fish, hamburgers, chicken, etc.–all the things that my friends say they could never live without. My first thought when I tried them was…so this is what everybody gets so worked up about? I just don’t see what all the fuss is about.

    Reply
  9. scarey

    Sep 5, 2011 at 9:48 am

    I am a light vegetarian, I do not eat ANY mammal or fowl, just a little seafood on occasion, a lot of veggie meats like MorningStar and Gardein, and my carbs are roasted or steamed, never fried. I feel better and my appetite is much smaller. When you don’t pack your body with slow digesting meat, your capacity gets smaller, and so does your appetite. Of course that also means don’t gorge yourself with major carbs esp fried as that will induce your appetite as well, so it’s not from no meat, it’s what else you are putting in your belly. As far as those that think going back to eating “grass fed, cage free, free range..etc” is ok, maybe you are not realizing that it’s not just HOW an animal is raised but what they endure just prior to slaughter, the horrific abuse and torture by those that work at slaughter plants. So it’s not necessarily the farms they come from raising them, but what happens to them once they leave there. From the horrific transportation to the slaughter plant, the ATROCITY that MOST people are unaware of, THAT is what MUST STOP!!!

    Reply
  10. cat hunter

    Aug 28, 2011 at 7:11 am

    As a pro-meat raw ‘vegan’, I am somewhat unusual lol

    Great article, and in support there is much material on how vegetarianism and veganism is no healthier than meat eating. In addition I would add, that having worked in both farming and hunting, a vegan world would reduce biodiversity, cause a further decline in animal welfare, and according to some studies, reduce the mean IQ of the ever growing and ever more futile population.
    Having said that, I have just lost 126lb and recovered terminally declining health by dropping many food groups, including meat from my diet. The further up the food chain you are, the more toxins you ingest from animals all the way up. I can only suggest that the people who have given up this vastly improved diet have not done sufficient research to get a full range of nutrients from other sources.

    Reply
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