Helencus - stangely i have not got attached at all to any of my pigs from day one their whole purpose was for us and all of kids to enjoy going and seeing some pigs, feeding them, going and give them the occasional scracth, laughing at them when they drag themselves out of the wallow and generally really enjoying the animals. but i NEVER detracted from the fact that they were for meat, and to be honest i am not a hard faced man and i had all of the same concerns as you are having, but as HM says if you look at them as pork from day one, you do tend to get your carnivores eyes on and look at the legs and imagine roast potatoes, apple sauce etc!
Go to the abattoir if you like but i very much doubt you will see anything, apart from a lot of animals being taken of trailers and walking into the holding pens, it is all very clean and business like and when we went was quite a nice atmosphere because of the amount of 'private kills' that were arriving everyone was excited about the final process, but a lot of pondering was also taking place.
The only down side to the abattoir was when the trailer with the commercial pigs turned up and the man was pushing, kicking the pigs down the ramp and they were slipping and sliding. so go witha n open mind coz that sight made me realise i will always now only eat pork i have reared and treated with respect.
Do it though, you will enjoy it so much
