Vegan baby

[Expecteddeclathon]

In your opinion, is it ok for a baby to be vegan from weaning (6 months)?

I don't think it's fair.

Firstly we don't know enough about vegan diets and long term or paediatric health. Humo Sapien is not a herbivores, our species evolved to eat some animal protein, so logical to assume that those foods play an important part in our diet.
There are many substances in non plant food that are only found there. I have a coiuple of vegan friends, both have to take supplements - one is permanently anemic, the other has to have monthly vitamin B12 injections.
Why would you gamble with your baby's long term health and current development?

I also think we don't have the right to choose veganism on behalf of a child. People are vegans for many reasons, and absolutely have the right to choose. The child should have the right to make that choice too- once they are old enough to understand.

You do need to plan very carefully, plants foods often don’t have complete proteins so you have to combine them to get complete poorer quality protein (your body doesn’t digest and use plant protein in the same way as animal protein) so vegan baby should probably overshoot vegan baby’s protein target and introduce tofu, tempeh etc

Op’s going to do it anyway, so she may as well do it as well as she can.

https://www.unisa.edu.au/unisanews/2021/july/story3

I don't know what your statement has to do with what I've said. It certainly doesn't negate what I said, and seems to bear no relation to it.

"What other species drinks the milk of another species?"

Erm...I'm not sure what your point is?

In my opinion (which is what you asked for) it's not ok for a baby to be forced to be vegan. I'm sure it can be done but I think it would be very difficult and enormously inconvenient. Why make all that extra work? If you have valid reasons for your choice (which you probably do), the child will probably make the choice for itself later in life.

Disagree all you like but it is factual that red meat is more nutrients dense and bioavailable. Also, your veggie sausages are UPF so cannot possible be healthier than the way nature made something that is unprocessed. Modern chicken is much less healthy than beef.

Its very difficult to get everything needed in a vegan diet, especially for a growing baby. Factor in fussiness and a dislike a certain foods and baby could be very easily become deficient.

Ive a friend who was raised veggie, shes only veggie now because she HAS to be, her body can't tolerate meat. I honestly dont think it was fair of her parents to do that to her.

Adults will eat things they dont like because its necessary and good for them, babies wont.

Would you consider supplementing with high welfare organic meat and dairy?

Longer term, will the baby go to nursery? Be on school dinners? Lots to consider.

No. Vegans carefully plan to ensure they consume enough protein and essential vitamins and amino acids. There are a small minority who eat UPF shit and carbs but most vegans know what they need to eat to be in optimum health.

Ugh
why are you still labouring this point? It's irrelevant and boring. And you even agreed at the end - if humans consumed mouse and elephant milk it would be dairy. But they don't, so it's not.

Eh it's a myth that being raised vegetarian causes people to lose the ability to tolerate meat. They probably get some gastric distress when first trying it and assume that means they are allergic or something. Humans are omnivores. Removing meat from your diet even for a really long time doesn't change the fundamental function of the body.

Done it. Have a healthy 8 year old who is excelling across the board and growing as expected.

And that's completely true BTW, but just adding a gentle reminder that people can say anything behind the Internet.

I'm happy to answer any specific questions or worries.

Fwiw, people will worry bevause its alien to them but probably won't say anything to your face.

I never lied to medical professionals (who incidentally never cast judgement but whom we've rarely had to visit thankfully) but if I sensed it would be awkward with e.g. cousin Pat, I used to fudge it and say she had a dairy intolerance and we're all vegetarian anyway so we're following a vegan diet for simplicity.

But it's honestly been fine.

We do a lot of porridge with flax, chia, nuts, peanut butter. Avocados everywhere. Lentils, chickpeas, stir fry with tofu. Vegan breakfasts are good. Mine happily ate: avocado, toast, baked beans, spinach, tofu and tomato for brunch yesterday. She eats loads of salad as well. Just make sure you're offering loads of fat.

Mine love tofu Whip mousse (basically silk tofu whipped with melted dark chocolate. Yoghurt and fruit is your friend. Tesco yoghurt is the best in terms of lower upf. Plenish milk as well.

Like I said, ask me if you need any info x

Completely believe this, we were buying clothes every few months when Dd was a toddler and she stopped growing completely for 6 months when we had to take dairy out of her diet, she was being regularly monitored, weighed and height taken by a paediatrician. She then refused milk after stopping it for so long and her doctor basically told us she didn’t care if DD was drinking chocolate milk but she really needed to reintroduce dairy.

A lot of kids have imperfect diets because it’s sometimes impossible to get them to eat properly but a bit of chicken, beef or fish, glass of milk is a nutritional
powerhouse compared to plant based foods.

I do think if you are going to do it you need to make sure you are including a lot of stuff you may not even have considered to give them the best health outcome possible. Bone density, brain development etc.

https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20200127-how-a-vegan-diet-could-affect-your-intelligence

Jains probably don’t eat the UPF vegan stuff available in U.K. like Richmond vegan sausages, fake bacon etc.

Veganism is an ethical philosophy not a diet. It’s about not exploiting or harming animals.

if a mother is feeding her baby with her own breast milk who is she exploiting?

How are the veggie sausages 'healthier'? They are probably UPF for a start and less natural than red meat.

Because you responded to me, and because you're wrong. Human milk is MILK, therefore it is a dairy product. People saying it's not dairy are quite simply wrong.

Whether or not it's VEGAN is neither here nor there - from what I gather on this thread, my eccentric great uncle who ate fresh roadkill he found would be vegan too, if that was the only animal product he ate! Also, eggs can be vegan apparently, and it seems that if an animal died of old age and you ate that, it would also be vegan. So I'm a little bewildered on those points.

But I do know that human milk is in fact milk, AKA dairy.

There is nothing reasoned and balanced about claiming breast milk isn't vegan.

I literally said "But it can be both dairy, and ethically vegan I suppose", so I'm not sure what your issue is?

It is going to be a heck of a lot of work to get the diet optimal for proper development of a baby, but try if you want....

You really need to be so bloody careful though, deficiencies are so easily caused in vegan diets and while they might go unnoticed in adults who can withstand it, babies are so vulnerable.

I wouldn't take the chance with my baby's development but if it makes you feel good I guess no one is going to stop you.

I think it’s unfair to restrict your child’s diet based on your own belief system.
My kids are allowed to try all food.
They can then make their own, informed, choices as adults.

I know this seems to infuriate some vegans/ religious people. But I guess it’s on brand for them to demand we all think the same way as them 🤷🏻‍♀️

I’m sure others have already said it as haven’t RTFT but how is it difficult to choosing meat eating on behalf of a child before they are of an age where they can discuss their choices?

Yes, of course, if it's a balanced diet. You're a vegan so you know the score, and there are loads of vegan weaning recipe books. Ignore your 'friend'.

I’ve never understood this argument. You could equally say you take away the choice to be vegan from a baby by providing animal products! I think most people raise their children to eat the food that they cook and eat themselves, and we don’t label that as forcing your choices on a child. The child can make their own dietary choices when they are old enough to do so.

OP, you will have lots of unhelpful comments here from people against veganism. Personally, although vegan myself, I’ve not managed it for my child for a few reasons but there’s no reason you can’t with proper planning and advice. The only things I think you should be prepared to consider:

• Introducing allergens. Dairy and eggs specifically, as they can be a potential contamination risk. You may need to be prepared to be flexible here in the short term.
• Fussy eating. Not likely to impact early on, but just remember adults can eat a healthy vegan diet because we can eat the things we should! If you end up with a food-refuser 12 months down the line you may need to seek advice and again prepare for flexibility.

Unless you’re a unique life form we’ve never heard of before, human breast milk is an animal product. It comes from mammals. Get out of that one 😉

I mean, it might be ethically vegan, but in terms of 'not consuming animal products' it fails at the first hurdle. On a very literal level, drinking breast milk is consuming an animal product (dairy), so it's not 'abstaining from the use of animal products and the consumption of animal source foods'.

I don't think anyone is going to get angry at babies for breaking their vegan diet in order to include a little ethical breast milk, though!

Funny, how its the non vegans who appear to be trying to impose their beliefs on a vegan on this thread then, isn't it? No one who isn't vegan or an expert in child nutrition can have anything useful to say in response to this OP. Yet once again, the word 'vegan' in a thread title has people for whom veganism has nothing to do with their lives rushing over to comment. Is that not just another way to "demand people think the same as them"?