“My wife forced our 12-year-old to go vegan, then I secretly started giving him meat.”
It’s been six years since Nina* became vegan.
After watching a documentary recommended by a friend, her perspective on food and its origins completely changed.
Since her conversion, she has encouraged her husband, Henry*, to join her.
Although he didn’t plan on becoming a full vegan, he wanted to make her happy, so he became a vegetarian.
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Mom forced the whole family to live vegan
During the six years she lived as a vegan, Henry continued Reddit that she is not afraid to call non-vegan food “disgusting” and refuses to eat it.
Although he doesn’t mind his wife’s change in diet and doesn’t mind cutting meat out of his diet for her, things got difficult when Nina asked their 12-year-old son Shane* to make the change too.
After seeing a “nutritionist” for their son, Henry agreed to let him follow a vegan diet as well.
“There’s nothing wrong with this agreement,” Henry said. However, a few months ago, he started finding empty wrappers of non-vegan lollies in his son’s school bag.
A little later he also discovered “burgers from McDonald’s that he had bought with work money.”
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Henry took his son aside and asked what was wrong.
“He confessed that he felt lonely and left out when he ate vegan around his friends and that they always had much better sweets than him and that wasn’t fair,” he said.
Henry was heartbroken by this statement and “didn’t want him to spend his allowance on snacks” when he could spend it on something he really wanted, like games.
But he knew his wife would be angry if she found out, even though Shane’s secret spending habits “made no sense.”
“So instead I started buying my son whatever he wanted on the way to soccer practice,” Henry wrote.
As the months passed, Nina didn’t notice any changes. However, that feeling of relief didn’t last long and she “completely freaked out” when the truth came out.
“She called me an animal abuse supporter and a few other names and said I was ruining our son,” Henry wrote.
Soon the insults stopped and she stopped speaking to him altogether, causing 12-year-old Shane to panic and tell her his father “bought the snacks for him and he didn’t know they weren’t vegan.”
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“This boy is at risk of being bullied because his mother cannot be reasoned with.”
People on Reddit agreed that Shane is old enough to know what he wants to eat and that his mother shouldn’t force him to eat vegan.
“If your wife confronts him about it in any intimidating way or tries to make him feel bad with the same phrases she uses with you, I would prioritize your son and his needs and well-being,” someone wrote.
“She’s trying to bully everyone with her choice,” another agreed. “I find it sad that this poor child is at risk of being bullied because of his inability to reason with his mother,” wrote one concerned person.
“The mother is a bully herself so her child being bullied won’t be noticed,” someone replied.
“I think we also forget that this is a 12-year-old boy,” someone chimed in. “Anyone who has spent time with a growing boy knows that he eats constantly. You can literally eat a whole rotisserie chicken in a day and still be foraging.”
“He would definitely need to take supplements if he actually wants to eat a vegan diet during exercise and puberty,” another suggested. “But if that’s the way [Henry’s] The child then wants to take it [Henry] needs to take their child to a real doctor and understand their body’s needs.”
*Names have been changed
