Seaspiracy!

[DeepThinkingGirl]

Hi all,

I watched the documentary yesterday and was really moved. I can never see fish the same way again.

I’m ashamed to admit that I don’t think stopping eating fish completely is an option for our young family. I tried going vegan for 2 years and I felt I didn’t go about it right and when my child was born very low weight I couldn’t stop blaming myself.

But I know for a fact I’m going to become much more conscious about my consumption.

I am wondering what everyone else plans to do in order to contribute to the solution of this huge problem indeed. I’m looking for inspiration.

Thanks

Oh gosh I want to watch this but I’m nervous to; currently pescatarian but feel like a bit of a hypocrite and know it’ll make me want to go full veggie, but we have so many good fish dishes in rotation at the moment! Should psyche myself up for viewing.

Ahh I know about the guilt! I think I’ve decided to take up fishing in the summer as it’s an eco friendly way to source fish and partly addresses the issue.

I’m also going to cook vegetarian options and save up for us to have free range meat twice a month or something which is sustainable.

But yeh it does mean less fish. And my progeny knowing that have to work hard for their meat.

I think my family is on board with it.

I haven't watched it yet...and I promise myself I shall...just as soon as I get over the messed up tirle/pun miss

Honestly I was so shocked. What an incestuous little world the fishing industry is.

Free range meat is just as disastrous. The green fields you see...they're deserts where almost all life has been wiped out to provide a steak or two. A beautiful old woodland full of life and biodiversity was removed by my home recently. All that life gone for the equivalent land to provide half a cow of meat every three years. Its awful. Not eating any animal or fish products is the only way to help, then jump onto the lab grown meat as soon as it starts appearing in the shops over the next few years.

Peacocking oh I’m genuinely scared to watch cowspiracy because I think I’m going to try to turn vegetarian first before I watch it and I want to go about it gradually.

I wonder if there is any books people recommend on how to have a balanced vegan diet for toddlers, as they’re my main worry

Do what you can and don't beat yourself up over what you are not doing.

I believe that dairy is really bad. My health is way better since I stopped that. Oatly do really good fortified milks - you could make that one small change. Or you could move to the fake chicken and other fake meats (most of the fake chicken is fabulous fried up, fake meat has come along so far).

If everyone just changes a bit, and keeps making small changes as they feel able...we can literally start to change the world together.

I felt the same way about watching things like cowspiracy back when I was vegetarian. But I also knew that if I was refusing to learn about the reality of the dairy industry then I couldn't meaningfully say that I was ignorant of it. Doing something because you're truly ignorant of the consequences is one thing, but deliberately maintaining ignorance in order to not feel bad about your choices is something else. I was a vegetarian for ethical reasons but I realised that I couldn't really claim that anymore if I was doing something that caused harm and lying to myself about it. Even so I spent another year or so ignoring it and trying to push down the cognitive dissonance. Once I finally went vegan I felt so much better, it was a real weight off my mind. But I totally understand wanting to change your diet slowly.

Plant based diets if done right can absolutely be healthy for most people including infants, but a lot of vegans do think that if you just eat a mostly whole food balanced diet you will automatically be getting everything you need and that just isn't true. There are plenty of things like calcium that you have to be intentional about including in your diet. I started off by reading the nutrition basics section of the vegan society website and choosing one of our regular meals per week to "veganise". I started with easy things like just not grating cheese on my pasta, and moved up to experimenting with ways to make vegan quiche etc. I learnt to cook intentionally vegan recipes rather than just vegan versions of vegetarian dishes, and experimented with different plant milks. I tracked my nutrition using chronometer and read up on which foods were best for filling the nutritional gaps. I'd say the whole process of transitioning our diet to become nutritionally complete and 100% plant based took about a year and that's partly because I have young children so wanted to get it right. Moving from just eating a plant based diet to actually being vegan took a bit longer as it involved more research.

Anyway that was my vegan "journey" and although I've heard plenty of criticism of vegans who don't go vegan overnight, I do think it's the most sustainable way to do it especially if you also need to consider the dietary needs of children.

So anyway, if anyone is putting off watching these documentaries because they don't want to feel bad about their choices, I would just go for it - you'll feel better knowing that you're at least facing reality and not wilfully living in ignorance. Then make the changes that align with your values at whatever speed you need to make them in order for them to represent a life long change.

And OP, if you're really feeling guilty about your baby being born a low birth weight then maybe speak to a doctor about it. It's entirely possible that your diet had nothing to do with it and you shouldn't have to live with that guilt. But obviously without knowing what you were eating I can't comment further on that.

Good luck 🙂