I turn 36 tomorrow. Sometimes it doesn’t feel like it – I can remember with clarity many things from my childhood. On the other hand, I can’t remember most of the book I finished last month. My retention is astonishingly weak.

Sometimes I like to joke that I’ve run out of room in my head to store much new information. After all, dust off the cobwebs in the dark recesses of my brain, and you’ll find a stray word or two left from the four years of French I took in high school and college. Those words (“shut your mouth,” “I would like a croissant, please”) aren’t going anywhere. The lyrics to “The Fresh Prince of Bel Air?” They’re staying put. New stuff needs to really fight for a spot in there.

When I began the process of stopping my use of animals in 2008, I also began the process of trying to cram a ton of new information related to that topic into my overcrowded brain. Amazingly, I have retained many facts and pieces of info from the countless books I’ve read, movies I’ve watched, podcasts I’ve listened to and talks I’ve attended. Ethical veganism is so aligned with who I am meant to be that it has found a way into my brain and it’s taken hold.

Because I was born on January 15th, here are 15 things I didn’t know before I was vegan. Some of these things seem to be common sense now. Some of them are just results of new experiences (or foods). And some of them are a ha moments – I can’t call them facts because they might not apply to everyone, but they are now a part of my truth, and that’s got to count for something.

1. Cows don’t “need to” be milked – they make milk for their babies, and so they need to have babies to produce milk.

I’m starting the list off with a “well, of course!” moment. Of course cows need to have babies to produce milk! They are mammals. Like other mammals, they nurse their young. But, like many of us, I didn’t give it much thought. Cows just made milk. The hows or whys were inconsequential. “Milking cows helps them.” Sure, that seems logical. But then, so did humans drinking the milk of another species. We are, in fact, the only mammal who does this. But as part of a society that is indoctrinated into the world of dairy from a very young age, most of us never think to question why.

RELATED READING: Dairy Industries Dirty Little Secret

2. There is animal byproduct in everything.

Laptops. Tires. Concrete. Wine. (Fish bladders, really?) Candy. No, really. Red coloring is sometimes derived from crushed up beetles. This is not necessary, but it’s a result of the fact that we use animals for other things.

RELATED READING: Warning: What You Don’t Know About Food Colors

3. Chickens have more than thirty different calls.

The rooster protects his hens and has distinct ways of notifying them of danger (like predators). They are awesome beings.

RELATED READING: Challenging Assumptions and Boundaries on Behalf of Chickens

4. Sheep and goats have rectangular pupils.

My experience with them was confined to petting zoos in my pre-vegan days. I never got up close till visiting a farm sanctuary.

5. Speaking of farm sanctuaries, they are life-changing – for the animals rescued from the industry they are bred into, of course, but also for the human visitors.

Sanctuaries changed me, and they change non-vegans. They are integral to the vegan movement, and that’s why Your Daily Vegan spotlights sanctuaries and the work that they do in Sanctuary Spotlight.

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