To feel a bit annoyed that my DD is no longer vegan?

[stallionsun]

DD is 22, left home in October and moved in with her boyfriend.

She decided to become vegetarian at 8yo and at 12yo she decided to be vegan.

For 10 years I bought and cooked vegan food for her as she stressed it was so important to her. She knew what extra work and expense this was, having to cook separate meals every night, and the extra expense on my shopping bill.

She was away in her boyfriend's home country for Christmas and New Year, and we are only getting to see her now and they are coming over for dinner on Friday night.

I said I'd seen a lovely vegan recipe to make for her and she said "oh, don't worry mum, I'm not vegan any more, it was just too much faff to make a vegan meal every night, and it costs so much more"

Too much faff and costs more? you don't say?

AIBU to be irritated that she happily let me put in the effort for her to be vegan for 10 years which was apparently so important to her but the second she moves out, she ditches he beliefs because it's too hard for her?

Kids don't realize how much you do for them until they have to do it themselves. Be grateful you don't have to do it anymore.

I wouldn't feel miffed. I would be proud that I supported her decision at the time she made it.

I do get how you feel though, but do try not to mention it to her 😜 I doubt if it is the only thing about adulting that she will find harder now she has to do it herself.

I would be annoyed too, but then at the same time glad she’s also not now a vegan!

I would also feel a little gobsmacked by this! Oh well, there's nothing you can do about it.

You needed to be tougher at the outset. One if my friends had already said to her kids they can go vegan once they’re cooking for themselves but not on her watch

People change their minds - particularly when they’re in love. She clearly wasn’t that committed

no wonder you're pissed off. but thats kids for you….

I mean YANBU but also this is just what it's like raising kids in thousands of different ways 😂

My friends son did this, meant every time they came over I had to cook a seperate meal for him, was irritating but you can’t say anything, soon as he lived on his own, he gave it up. Was happy to do it when someone else was paying and cooking, wasn’t so big into it when he had to. So yes I get you.

At 22 she should have had at least 3 or 4 years of cooking and paying for her own food to have already realised this. Even if she was doing it in your house.

That’s kids for you

This.

If anyone in my house wanted to change their diet for non medical reasons, I'd let them know they were welcome to when they were doing the cooking. I wouldn't have spent 10 years faffing about cooking separate meals.

How did she get to 22 with no awareness of the effort or cost involved in providing her with vegan food? You cooked and paid for almost everything? That's a decision you made which is separate to her veganism.

I’d just claim to be a person that only eats lobster/ caviar and fillet steak when I visit her 😂😂

See also: "Gosh, aren't the energy bills high when you run the dryer every day and leave every light on all the time and keep the place at a tropical temperature all day and night? I need to rein it in a bit". You don't say, dear. Enjoy having your own home...

YABU

You should have talked it though properly when she was 8/12 and explained the extra work/expense etc.

Loads of girls do this. My DD's entire friendship group decided to go vegetarian when they were about 8. I told my DD that I had my hands full and that it wasn't practical at the time. None of them are vegetarian 10 years on.

Why ?

Did you share the planning, coking and shopping with her? If not, it’s your lookout.

As I repeatedly say, you are raising effective adults, not just parenting children. If you don’t allow them to see all the consequences, and tasks, they won’t.

I'm confused, whilst I get that it's extra effort to make meals to cater to two different dietary requirements, how can it be more expensive to be vegan than a meat eater?

Well same with a lot of things if it was so important to her she could have been told that is great you want to be vegan so when you are older you can do so same with getting a tattoo or signing contracts

Why did you do all that extra work to allow her to be vegan without getting her involved in all the extra cooking and organising?

That’s kids! How many people run around ragged taking them to a particular activity, incurring huge cost, supporting them, arranging family life around it etc only for them to turn around at some point and unceremoniously quit? That’s life.

@Egglio because she would have been buying additional meals and ingredients to cater for the vegan 🤷🏼‍♀️

I wouldn't have facilitated it op. I was vegetarian for most high school. My mum wouldn't make separate meals - usually meat, veg, pot. So I got veg and pot. If I wanted anything else I had to sort it myself.

Yanbu.
But your post has made me understand better when several of my daughters friends announced that they were now vegan, that their parents said they could make the decision when they left home and cook for themselves if they wished, but their working parents were cooking one meal per evening.

I think you can be glad at all the animals you've saved.