If another child told yours about meat and the meat industry

[SkyWalker95]

I saw a post on FB today of a mother having a full blown melt down over the fact another child had explained to their 5 year olds that the cows they see in the field are killed, drained, and butchered, and thats what was in his sandwich. Therefore her child no longer wanted to eat it. She was talking like it was such an outrageous thing to tell him and that somehow the other kids was wrong to tell him. And shockingly all the comments where in agreement with her. This can't be a normal reaction surely?

*dairy

My 5 yo doesn't know where meat is from. She is just not that sharp and isn't curious about the world - I have tried to explain it many times. She would be upset if someone used dramatic language to explain it I think.

I took the kids to a bird of prey show years ago where they gave a huge owl a dead chick for good behavior or something and several mothers freaked out. One bizarrely told her daughter it was chocolate. People can be funny about death.
Mine know where meat comes from. It did cause some issues though initially because my 3 or 4 year old asked what dog meat is called and if we could eat the dog which led to a bit of a kerfuffle with the inlaws over a bad joke a friend posted to my Facebook.

Hedgehog being vegan doesn't cause health problems and is actually often a cure for anorexia not a cause. I think they need to see a doctor, make sure there's not something actualy wrong. That worries me to read

If you choose to eat meat, you should deal with the facts about where it comes from. I decided I couldn't, so went vegetarian in my late 20s.

The health conditions were pre existing. The ethics lesson-veganism-anorexia due to the fact my dd is so strict with herself and then decided it could also help her conditions so got even stricter. So, you're right veganism im the right circumstances is fine and healthy but it was that ethics lesson that kicked off what is now an unhealthy obsession going under the name of veganism

Hedgehog do you mean othorexic?

Hedgehog unfortunately I think you're right - veganism has been adopted by a lot of young people as a ready excuse for not eating. I'm a tubby vegan so it is by no means true! It sounds like your DD may have anxiety as well - poor her, and you

Just in case it hasn't been explicitly stated on here: humans need 0.8g protein per kg of body weight daily. Therefore a 50kg woman (for instance) requires 40g of protein daily. That is easily achievable via plant-based sources, and keeping within calorie allowance too.

This data was presented at a congress earlier this year - really interesting stuff. It's from a study of over 3000 Dutch infants over a 10-year period.

www.independent.co.uk/news/health/protein-toddlers-consume-four-times-too-much-obesity-body-fat-children-milk-cheese-meat-dairy-a7745566.html

"Toddlers are consuming more than four times as much protein than they need to, a new study has found."

"Parents have been warned to watch their children’s intake of meat, cheese and milk after researchers linked protein-rich diets to higher levels of body fat."

"She said protein from animal sources had the greatest effect on levels of body fat, adding it was not just a case of children being given too much milk, with other protein sources such as cheese, yoghurt, meat and fish all adding up."

At what age should they know?

Mine don't I don't think but it's just not a subject that's ever arisen. I know I've never spoken to them about it. Do you think I should before it's discussed at school?! Don't want her being freaked out by another kid describing the slaughter process!!

Dd is 10 she has been pescatarian since she was 7 and since seeing her male cousins fishing with live bait won't eat fish. She realised the connection about a year earlier (aged 6) and wanted to go meat free. I told her 6 was too young to decide, but I allowed it a year later. Ds is as sharp as a knife and probably knew all about it before school and is fine with eating meat.

No, the diagnosis is anorexia not orthorexia although the specialists all agree that dd has not followed the usual route and has gone what they call a different and unusual way as she started off vegan due to genuine ethics apparently after then wanted to improve her other conditions with diet and has ended up at this point. They've said it's unusual.

Gaggle
The earlier the better
I work with 2-4 year olds and we often talk about where food comes from
simple, honest information is best

IME most five/six/seven year olds are gruesome little herberts. The social awareness that they shouldn't share the fascinating new fact they've found out about what happens to slugs which crawl over salt, or how burgers are made, with their sensitive classmate comes rather later. It's rare for a five year old to know that much about butchery but once they know, no power on earth will stop them sharing.

Jeez how on earth do you broach the subject?!!

Gaggle, IME it comes up very naturally. I've never brought up the subject myself but DD (4) is very interested in what people are eating. We're vegetarian, which she accepts, but she is also very accepting of the fact that many other people aren't -- e.g. daddy eats fish, other children at nursery eat different types of meat, and she knows what kind of animal the different types of meat come from as well as how various vegetables and fruits grow. I've never forced the issue; it's just come up via cooking or choosing food in the supermarket and her natural curiosity! I was expecting it to be a bit more consciously planned (and especially that she might question why we are vegetarian, which I don't really have a great answer for other than that I was brought up that way and am used to it!) but it wasn't.

The bit that did upset her was about animals being killed in order for people (or other animals) to eat them. She really didn't like the idea of that. However I explained that some animals were natural predators, so for example if a wild cat didn't catch birds or mice to eat, it would starve. So she kind of understands that it's a cycle, and that some things die so that other things can live. She's pretty unforgiving of daddy's sushi habit, though! She think he could just stick with the avocado maki

See it's just never come up, surprising really seeing as we're a mixed family, I'm veggie and he's not.
She cooks with me but I've never really gone into the details of what sausages were before they were sausages etc.
Got me thinking now!

You could start by talking about where different fruits and vegetables come from? (e.g. apples and cherries grow on trees, grapes grow on vines, carrots grow underground etc). Sausages are a weird one as they can pretty much be made from anything! But something like bacon or mince might be simpler to explain.