DH wants me to eat meat!

[ElizabethForever]

I have been a vegan my entire life. My parents are vegans and my siblings are. My husband is mainly vegan as I do the food shopping and cooking. I have never stopped him eating the food he wants to eat however anything containing animal products in the garage (we have a fridge/freezer out there).
I am in the very very early stages of pregnancy and since we found our DH keeps making hints that I should be eating meat to keep the baby healthy. I have never had any problems with my iron levels etc but I have never been pregnant before. DH has upset me by suggesting I go against something which is obviously a huge part of my life but I don’t know if I’m being unreasonable to be upset or if hormones are making me think more of it? Thanks

Not my guess is that it's part ethical & part disgust at having something the OP finds abhorrent I her fridge. I feel the same about meat & won't have it in the house or allow it to be cooked in my pans or oven. I smell it & the smell disgusts me on both levels. Thankfully none of us eat it though, so it's only really an issue for guests

Of course he is being unreasonable. If you were 30-ish and had always been a meat eater, and then turned vegan, at 31, and then 3 months later became pregnant, then I could kind of understand his worries. However, if you have been a vegan all your life, as a few posters have said, it would be worse, and more unhealthy to start eating meat now.

Your body, your choice. And unfortunately, even though it's his baby too, YOU are the one carrying it.

So offering your own opinion about how you wouldn’t tolerate such a set-up is, as my old mum used to say, interesting but irrelevant

I would say this applies to about 90% of the posts on MN......

Rockin

You cook meat for guests?

I would say this applies to about 90% of the posts on MN......

In your opinion

Rockin - ah ok so "contamination" was my red herring (!) as it were. Thanks for explaining.

@FamilyofAliens

Nooooo 🤢
Definitely not, I won't allow it to be cooked in the house full stop as none of us are okay with it.

I one tried to do Turkey for MIL Xmas dinner,apparently it was very nice, but it made me feel so ill I couldn't eat. Never again

Meat eaters do get so over excited about their rights, don’t we?

Rockin

My mum brought a turkey crown with her when she and my dad came for Christmas one year.

Our cat still dreams about the leftovers

I began having bad muscle cramps/restless legs/tingling in pregnancy which my GP said was calcium deficiency. The growing baby was taking the calcium it needed, leaving me with insufficient for my own body. He recommended extra milk and cheese - which it was easy for me to eat.

I'm aware that there are vegan sources of calcium.

I think it's easier if one can be quite flexible with babies. Whatever they need. Whatever works for them.

If you have very strong ethical principles, then it's complicated by constraints around what you believe to be morally right - not what the other person wants/needs/could be best for them..

Sometimes it can be an awkward trade-off.

Meat eaters do get so over excited about their rights, don’t we?

That's because we are treated so badly. Every time I eat with a vegetarian I have to listen to complaints about the lack of vegetarian options and the waiter gets asked about the kind of gelatin used in deserts.

When we go to a vegetarian restaurant and I ask if they have even one meat option I get abused.

That happens every time you eat with a vegetarian, cdtaylornats?

Maybe say something to them or get new friends? And tell them there’s only one type of gelatine while you’re at it. Educate the fuckers

I’d say it’s perfectly possible he’s just worried. So rather than go on the defensive, why not just reassure him instead? Tell him where your protein is from, and also speak to the midwife, let her know you are vegan. It is easy to miss some nutrients being vegan, which might be okay when not pregnant but exacerbates when you are.

Tell him you want him to become Vegan, see how tgat goes down !

“That's because we are treated so badly”

Oh, bollocks.

I have been veggie since I was 10 when I was pregnant I was told my iron levels were fine. This is because I was proactive and took some iron supplements so it wasn't ever an issue. Obviously I eat dairy and you don't but there isn't generally a great deal of iron there so tell your dh that you are going to go on an iron supplement and that he should back off. My midwife also gave me a great tip, eat a kiwi when you take the supplement the vitamins in it will help your body absorb the iron more efficiently.
What about baby? Will they be vegan? That's when your really going to find there could be real questions raised. My hv was horrified that my dd was going to be raise vegetarian she really tried hard to persuade me otherwise.

It is hard to sympathise enough for those poor, poor waiters being asked about gelatine in desserts - often more than once in the same evening

Threads concerning vegans really do bring out the (non-vegan) fruitcakes, don't they.

“It is hard to sympathise enough for those poor, poor waiters being asked about gelatine in desserts - often more than once in the same evening”

I know. And imagine going to a vegetarian restaurant and discovering that there are no meat dishes! The trauma!!

Is it possible that your dh is receiving and being influenced by 'advice' and concerns from others?

I would ask him what specifically he is worried about so that you can address each concern and hopefully put his mind at rest.

@ToEarlyForDecorations
So it's ok for vegans to breastfeed their babies but not for them to have milk from an animal source. What's that about ?

Human breast milk is produced for the purpose of feeding human babies.
Animal milk, such as cows milk is produced for the purpose of feeding infant calfs.
HTH.

I’ve been vegan since my early teens.
I had a perfectly healthy pregnancy and have a very healthy vegan 12 year old.

As long as you make sure you are getting enough iron and b12 you will be prefectly fine.
Tell your DH to keep his opinions to himself.

Some of this thread is totally bizarre. Loads of women have shit diets in pregnancy for whatever reason - my first trimester diet was mainly bread, macaroni cheese and chocolate muffins because that's all I could stomach. Hasn't done me or baby any harm (in fact, I was borderline anaemic before I got pregnant, by 12 weeks my iron levels were totally normal by some fluke). I'm not vegan at all but I'm sure it's perfectly possible to get everything you need from a vegan diet without the need for some of the scaremongering on this thread.

I think your DH is probably just concerned so you should be able to reassure him if he comes along to see the midwife/hv or any other medical appointments with you.
I do think you need to start talking about whether or not baby will be vegan though. Are you going to be happy if DH gives little one animal products?

Most pregnant women struggle with iron deficiency, but you can take tablets for it. Your husband sounds OTT.

I really disagree that there’s anything “controlling” about keeping animal products in the garage fridge - I imagine it’s about OP feeling comfortable in her own home. What is food to one person is a piece of a dead body to another. People should be able to express their feelings without being accused of proselytizing/being judgmental.