Need advice (problems w/ my non-veg GF)

[Nocturne]

Hi guys and gals!

I'm new here, and as you can see, this is my first post. I was searching on the net for a solution to a problem I’m having as no one I know has had a similar problem and then I stumbled upon this board. I decided to register in hope to get some solutions, or at least some suggestions. Anyway, here goes (bear with me, I know it's a long read!)

I’m a 25 year old guy who’s been in a steady 3.5 year relationship (which mostly has been long distance) and it has, as all relationships, had it’s ups and downs. Now, I believe, we’ve hit a new low and I don’t know if we’ll ever recover from this.

It started with that we have been talking a lot about moving in together, getting married, having children etc. lately. We’ve talked about this before, actually, many, many times, always ending in arguments and fights, but it has never been this serious. As we’re both finishing our studies and stuff, we were ready to take it to the “next level”. However, when the issue of children was brought up, we of course also went into the whole vegetarian - non-vegetarian debate. For me, having been raised as a vegetarian (thanks to my parents), there was no question that my children would follow in my foot-steps. My girlfriend eats meat, but I never had a problem with my friends eating meat, and though I initially said stuff to her about eating meat, it created so much problems that I stopped. I never say anything to her anymore. I realized I can’t change her and that I shouldn’t try.

However, when (or if) we ever have kids, there is a choice to be made and for me, the choice is clear - no meat. For her, it’s not that serious, and she has agreed to them not eating meat, but, she says, only till they hit an age they can make a conscious decision for themselves. I immediately said this age should be 18, but she thinks it should be more like 10 or 12 or something. Anyway, the discussion evolved to the point that we were yelling and screaming to each other (on skype, since we’re in different countries at the moment) and I hung up on her.

The last week has been tense, the discussion comes up in every conversation we have and it has always ended in one of us hanging up on the other, only to try and solve it again the next time we call each other, and then, it begins again. I see no way out of this.

The core of the problem is this; though she says it’s OK to raise our children as vegetarians, I asked her what we should tell them if they ask why they can’t eat meat when everybody (including her and her family) does. I said I’d tell them why (based on facts) and that I’d even go to the lengths of showing them vids of animals being slaughtered. She absolutely freaked out, and I understand now, I went over the line; of course I’d never show a young child such videos, but it was, as you can imagine, a heated debate. If my child were to ask me where meat comes from, why should I lie? Should I not tell them about the inhumane ways in which chickens and calves are taken from their mothers and mass-slaughtered, daily, for consumption? And for what? For our palates sake? I ask her if she thinks it’s ethical to slaughter animals the way they do it, she says yes. When I go to specific methods in which these animals are slaughtered, she either doesn’t want to hear it, or says “that doesn’t sound right”. When I ask her, “well, if it doesn’t sound right, why do you have a problem with me telling our unborn children about this? And why do you keep eating meat if you agree its wrong?” - then she backs up on herself, saying she doesn’t think it’s wrong (confuses the hell out of me) and that I’m trying to change her.

Truth is, I’ve given up on “changing her”, I respect her for her decision and I tell her; “all I need to know is that your decision to eat meat is an informed one, that you understand where your food comes from and that your comfortable with that”. Again, she says this is me trying to change her, she says “in this country EVERYBODY eats meat, it’s normal, and not something you have to question or doubt in order to live your life happily. I’m not loosing sleep over some chickens...”

The biggest fear she has is that my “propaganda” will eventually turn our future children against her family who are all meat-eaters. She feels I will do anything to alienate them from her parents, siblings etc. Of course I don’t want to do anything to the fact. BUT, if my child asks me why they shouldn’t eat meat, and she says it’s OK to tell them why I don’t, as long as I don’t go into the specifics of it, is it then my fault if my children have a problem with her family? I don’t want that for them, of course, her family are great people, I like all of them and they like me, and they respect the fact that I don’t eat meat, however, for me, there’s something fundamentally wrong by not raising my future children as vegetarians.
I afraid what they will think if I say meat eating is wrong, that innocent animals are being killed and consumed without consent or choice, while she sits there and eats a hot-dog and says she thinks it’s OK?

As I said, I never thought it’d come to this, I never had a problem with my friends eating meat, and after a while, I grew comfortable eating dinner at her place (her mother makes something vegetarian for me always, even if it’s just salad) - well, as comfortable as a life-long vegetarian can be at a meat-eating table. But this is life, sadly, and there are far more people who eat meat than those who don’t.

I’d like to hear from people who have been in similar situations, or people who can give me some advice. Please don’t tell me to show her videos, or educate her etc. I’ve tried that in the past and I almost lost her because of it (she called it propaganda) - the truth is just too hard to swallow for some people I guess..

Sorry for writing an essay. Had a lot on my mind. :confused:

- Nocturne -

[Licence]

Hi and welcome to VB.

Sounds like you got a pretty good result with yr GF agreeing to 10-12 yrs old before your kids can decide for themselves, because in reality at 10-12 yrs old they'll be making their own minds up anyway.

If you're happy with everything else about yr relationship (including the fact she obviously doesn't have any compassion about animals) this doesn't seem like a dealbreaker to me. I would just let it go.

[Indian Summer]

Welcome to VB!

Since your reasons for being vegetarian seem to be mainly ethical considerations, and she doesn't want to change, it seems to me that this will forever be a problem in your relationship. Or at least I know it would have been a problem for myself in the same situation.

This boards is full of vegetarian girls at just the right age for you. Good luck :p

[insan0r]

Welcome to VB!

We have a related thread in our "Raising vegetarian children" regarding this topic: http://www.veggieboards.com/boards/showthread.php?p=2091201#post2091201 maybe you can find some interesting statements in there.

For me that sounds as a neverending topic which always will cause problems... Hope for you you'll find a solution, I don't know one - I've never been in such a situation and all I would suggest has already been said.

[Shifu]

Personally, I think kids should be raised as veggies until they are old enough to handle the ETHICAL dilemma of meat. And I think 18 is too old - they will make their own decisions before then. 10-12 does sound like more of the right age, but you can judge it as you go depending on the child. I think its great your GF has agreed to raise them veggie at all... and if you do have kids, as they are getting older you can both decide together when they are old enough to learn about what meat is, where it comes from and so on (without giving them nightmares of course). Children mature at different ages so maybe you and your GF could agree to just take it as it comes?

Maybe treat it the same way as you would any other different ethical decision, or sex education, where a certain level of maturity and the ability to truly understand the topic and the implications involved in decisions, is needed.

[rabid_child]

I think that getting a decade to raise your kids vegetarian is actually pretty good!! You can't watch them every minute. They'll be eating lunch at school, going to birthday parties, hanging out with friends without you around to monitor everything that goes into their mouths and realistically they're going to "experiment" with meat. In our household I'm vegetarian and my boyfriend is not, though he eats veg at home, and he agrees that when we have children we'll raise them vegetarian with the assumption that I'm not going to keep them in a bubble and that they will, at some point, choose for themselves what they want to do. Regardless of their decision they'll still be vegetarian at home because I don't want meat cooked in my house! I hope that by the time my children are faced with the decision to eat meat or not they'll have enough of my ethics drilled into their heads that they'll choose not to. If not? If eating meat is the worst thing they do, we will have raised a damn good kid.

[bluesand]

I think what licence said pretty well covered it . Your kids might not want to eat meat when they are 10/12 anyway , so you are making a mountain out of a mole hill .

By that time your wife might be vegetarian , its not nice to be around people that have the desire of conversion , which you seem to have worked out , just leave her alone and she might come around to veg in her own way .

BTW :hi: and welcome

[MRSSHF]

It seems to me that the real crux of the issue is the debate about what to tell them when they ask why mommy eats meat and they don't. Personally, I think that when you are raising children vegetarian, the best way to approach it is to tell them that "Animals are our friends, and we don't eat our friends." And "Mommy (and her family) eats meat because it's a bad habit." At the same time, you want to instill empathy into your hypothetical children so that they will understand that animals are alive and that they feel pain, etc. Of course, you and your girlfriend are going to have to sit down and not shout at each other to determine what you really want to tell your kids. It sounds to me like maybe she is hoping that once they are old enough to ask, if she has gotten you to agree not to educate them, even gently, into the ethical reasons for not eating meat, that they will just take the "easier" path and start eating meat themselves. She needs to get honest with you about her secret desires, which is probably that she can somehow change you into a meat eater because that would be a lot easier for her.

I have to add this. I love my husband very much, and he converted to being a pescoterian for me, plus he respects that our home is Vegan, and he doesn't have a big problem with me raising Will Vegan (although he whines about stupid crap like not being able to buy the baby a hot dog at a baseball game). However, if I would have been Vegan before I met him, I might not have married him, and he is much more similar to me ethically than your girlfriend apparently is to you. This is a MAJOR ethical divide, like a Fundamentalist Christian marrying an Atheist. Can such a relationship be successful? I guess so. But you are definitely adding a level of difficulty to the relationship, and it sounds like this is already a bone of contention between the two of you, and you aren't even married yet. I can't help but scratch my head every time a Veg*n man willingly entangles himself with an omni female when there are so many Veg*n women out there who would love a Veg*n male.

Long post boiled down to one sentence: If you can't discuss this rationally, then you probably don't belong together, and maybe you and her should cut your losses.

[pandora9kry]

Personally, I think that when you are raising children vegetarian, the best way to approach it is to tell them that "Animals are our friends, and we don't eat our friends." And "Mommy (and her family) eats meat because it's a bad habit."

This is a really great, simple, explanatory way of putting it. A bad habit is a really gentle, kind way of explaining meat-eating. Kudos to you!

My boyfriend and I have had the same argument. I want to raise our kids veg, and he thinks that by not having any meat (or dairy) in our home, we are robbing them of the choice to eat these foods. His logic is that if they don't eat them once in awhile as kids, they will lose the enzymes necessary to digest them without feeling sick.

I'm not sure if this is the case for meat, but for dairy, I know that happens. To me, I don't think it's a big deal if they don't feel well after eating pretty unhealthy foods. It shows them what their body really thinks of that junk!!

So far, our compromise is that he will cook a small amount of meat once a week or so, and I won't eat it. I'm not sure how things will go from there.

[Marie]

Maybe you guys shouldn't have kids if you're already freaking out about how to raise them. Parents should show a united front.. otherwise you'll have kids playing one parent off against the other.

[Diana]

Maybe you guys shouldn't have kids if you're already freaking out about how to raise them. Parents should show a united front.. otherwise you'll have kids playing one parent off against the other.

I agree with Marie.

But I also think that your relationship with your girlfriend doesn't look like it's going to be a bed of roses. So think twice before having children just because you think having kids sounds like fun.

[ashlend]

Hi and welcome to VB.

Sounds like you got a pretty good result with yr GF agreeing to 10-12 yrs old before your kids can decide for themselves, because in reality at 10-12 yrs old they'll be making their own minds up anyway.

If you're happy with everything else about yr relationship (including the fact she obviously doesn't have any compassion about animals) this doesn't seem like a dealbreaker to me. I would just let it go.

I have to agree... especially since this is all completely hypothetical at this stage. There is enough in life to argue and fight about without screaming at one another over things that aren't going to happen for a decade or more down the road (if at all.)

As long as you've agreed on the basic thing -- raising them vegetarian -- I would leave the specifics for later. Like another poster said, you have no idea how things will be when your hypothetical kids are 10-12 years old... your girlfriend might even be veg herself by then. Or maybe she'll have a different view on things, even if she isn't.

Not worth breaking up over IMO. But I do think you should examine how you really feel about potentially marrying an omni, because in truth you seem very conflicted over the fact that she doesn't share your values.

[Indieorganicveg]

I think she's right about their age for the choice. I became a vegan at 11. I mean this in no way rude, but your girlfriend sounds like something.
Why wouldn't you show your children the videos I watched it when I was 11 and I didn't puke or vomit. It was the truth and the truth shall set you free.
You should ask yourself whether you really love her before you make any next level decisions because children are permanent, you can't just erase them or take them away.

[synergy]

I can sympathize with your situation.

I had been in a live in relationship for 3 years or so and then became a vegetarian, which added a lot of conflict into our lives. When we discussed having kids, I thought I was being incredibly reasonable saying, I won't feed them meat, but if you want to, have at 'er. He said "fine, we just won't have kids then." What the hell, hey? Basically he argued and argued about it, and it was just a symptom of our underlying values being very different. We had basically just grown apart. I moved out a couple of months after this conversation. 4 years later, I know that was the best choice I ever made.

I've dated a couple of omni's since, and it was just fine because they knew going into it that I was a vegetarian. One of them just assumed we would raise kids vegetarian if we had any, and the other ... well... we haven't discussed it, but I'm sure it'll be a compromise of some kind.

I don't know if this is going to be a deal breaker for you, but a relationship becomes really difficult if someone can't accept who their partner is and what they believe.

Good luck!!!

[XvegankateX]

reason 7562494595 why i wont date an omni

[Nocturne]

Hi again,

Wow - thanks for all the replies, I didn’t expect that many people responding, guess it’s quite a large community huh? I’ll try to go reply by reply, probably’ll take me a lot of time, but it’s only fair since you guys took your time to respond. The thread'll be long, so I'll have to break it up - here we go..



License wrote:

Hi and welcome to VB.

Sounds like you got a pretty good result with yr GF agreeing to 10-12 yrs old before your kids can decide for themselves, because in reality at 10-12 yrs old they'll be making their own minds up anyway.

If you're happy with everything else about yr relationship (including the fact she obviously doesn't have any compassion about animals) this doesn't seem like a dealbreaker to me. I would just let it go.
__________________
IGNORANCE: making people feel righteous for over 2000 years.



Thanks License.

I agree that maybe 10-12 years for deciding for themselves isn’t so bad, the problem is that, if I “educate” them the way I want to, then I won’t worry by that age because then they’ll hopefully understand what I’m on about. However, if I can’t explain WHY I feel it’s wrong to eat meat, then maybe they’ll think it’s not such a big deal, “Daddy’s weird”, as they’ll see everyone else, including their friends and relatives eating meat.

I’m not happy about everything else, no. But that’s a different story..:p


Indian Summer wrote:

Welcome to VB!

Since your reasons for being vegetarian seem to be mainly ethical considerations, and she doesn't want to change, it seems to me that this will forever be a problem in your relationship. Or at least I know it would have been a problem for myself in the same situation.

This boards is full of vegetarian girls at just the right age for you. Good luck 
__________________
veganhealth.org | ubuntu | slayradio.org | HVSC


Thank you Indian Summer. My parents reasons for being vegetarian are religious, and I was raised in that “tradition”, however, as I’ve matured, I’ve found the ethical reasons more ... appealing as I’m not a very religious person (though I’m not an atheist or agnostic).

I’ll check out the veg. girls here, lol - they’re so hard to find here were I live!



Insan0r

Welcome to VB!

We have a related thread in our "Raising vegetarian children" regarding this topic: http://www.veggieboards.com/boards/s...01#post2091201 maybe you can find some interesting statements in there.

For me that sounds as a neverending topic which always will cause problems... Hope for you you'll find a solution, I don't know one - I've never been in such a situation and all I would suggest has already been said.
__________________
MAOZ addict!


Thanks Insan0r. I’ll read up on that thread, actually, I saw a lot of similar topics on this forum, so I’ll browse around after I post this.


Shifu

Personally, I think kids should be raised as veggies until they are old enough to handle the ETHICAL dilemma of meat. And I think 18 is too old - they will make their own decisions before then. 10-12 does sound like more of the right age, but you can judge it as you go depending on the child. I think its great your GF has agreed to raise them veggie at all... and if you do have kids, as they are getting older you can both decide together when they are old enough to learn about what meat is, where it comes from and so on (without giving them nightmares of course). Children mature at different ages so maybe you and your GF could agree to just take it as it comes?

Maybe treat it the same way as you would any other different ethical decision, or sex education, where a certain level of maturity and the ability to truly understand the topic and the implications involved in decisions, is needed.
__________________
"I do not wish to consume bovine lactate at any temperature."
~Teal'c (Stargate)


I agree that 18 is a bit too old, and we could agree to take it “as it comes”, the problem with that however is that I’m afraid what’ll happen when I’m not around. And I won’t be around for long periods of time due to my field of work. What’ll happen if my kids then don’t have the proper “education” about meat? Also, why at all, give the kids the choice unless they ask for it? If my 12-year old would ask me, can I eat meat daddy - I’d probably say no, but if they were raised the way I want them to be raised, this and other such questions would never come up at all, see?

But I agree that I can’t start educating them from they’re toddlers, it indeed requires a certain level of maturity to understand what meat-eating involves..

[Nocturne]

Pt. 2 guys:


Rabid Child

I think that getting a decade to raise your kids vegetarian is actually pretty good!! You can't watch them every minute. They'll be eating lunch at school, going to birthday parties, hanging out with friends without you around to monitor everything that goes into their mouths and realistically they're going to "experiment" with meat. In our household I'm vegetarian and my boyfriend is not, though he eats veg at home, and he agrees that when we have children we'll raise them vegetarian with the assumption that I'm not going to keep them in a bubble and that they will, at some point, choose for themselves what they want to do. Regardless of their decision they'll still be vegetarian at home because I don't want meat cooked in my house! I hope that by the time my children are faced with the decision to eat meat or not they'll have enough of my ethics drilled into their heads that they'll choose not to. If not? If eating meat is the worst thing they do, we will have raised a damn good kid.
__________________
eats shoots and leaves
veg*n food by meg*n -> http://megatarian.blogspot.com




The fact that I “got a decade” to raise my kids vegetarian was a big compromise. As I wrote before, my future work will involve a lot of travel, and I’d actually like to move around a lot and see new places and meet new faces, my GF is totally opposite in that respect. She loves her family and doesn’t want to move from our small town here in Norway. She’s close to her siblings and her mother, but for me, there’s no future in this town, and I HAVE to move, or at least, commute, and that’s what we agreed on. In exchange for the fact that I agreed to live in this hole (sorry, I have issues with this place, it bores the hell out of me) she agreed to raise our kids as vegetarians. This was a big deal to me, and not moving from here was a big deal to her. So we both made a sacrifice to have it “our” way.

I know I can’t monitor them all the time, however, I grew up in this country as a vegetarian, my parents told my kindergarten I couldn’t eat meat, and throughout my childhood, during birthday parties, school, etc. etc. I never felt different or left-out because I didn’t eat meat. People were very understanding (at least back then) and I was always provided for during events such as birthdays for example and my parents would always bring something along if the host didn’t cook anything for me, though they usually did. So I’m not so worried about that. It’s more the fact that they’ll eat meat because they don’t know why they shouldn’t because my GF won’t let me teach them! :(



Bluesand

I think what licence said pretty well covered it . Your kids might not want to eat meat when they are 10/12 anyway , so you are making a mountain out of a mole hill .

By that time your wife might be vegetarian , its not nice to be around people that have the desire of conversion , which you seem to have worked out , just leave her alone and she might come around to veg in her own way .

BTW  and welcome
__________________
"Beliefs separate. Loving thoughts unite."


Again, as MRSSHF writes below, the crux is the fact that I can’t tell them why they shouldn’t eat meat. And my future wife (if I marry her) will never turn 100% vegetarian. I know this for a fact. It’s her personality, she is all about traditions and what not (imagine Christmas for her without meat with her family = impossible :p) - however, she rarely eats meat when she’s with me, mostly because I’m always cooking (I love to cook, and she hates to cook) and also, when we go out to eat, she usually orders something veg. so we can share the meal. In that respect, she’s not as meat-craving as most people I know. But she’ll never turn 100% veg. and I can understand that, it ain’t easy to let go of something you’re used to having almost every day..

Thanks btw.. :)



MRSSHF

It seems to me that the real crux of the issue is the debate about what to tell them when they ask why mommy eats meat and they don't. Personally, I think that when you are raising children vegetarian, the best way to approach it is to tell them that "Animals are our friends, and we don't eat our friends." And "Mommy (and her family) eats meat because it's a bad habit." At the same time, you want to instill empathy into your hypothetical children so that they will understand that animals are alive and that they feel pain, etc. Of course, you and your girlfriend are going to have to sit down and not shout at each other to determine what you really want to tell your kids. It sounds to me like maybe she is hoping that once they are old enough to ask, if she has gotten you to agree not to educate them, even gently, into the ethical reasons for not eating meat, that they will just take the "easier" path and start eating meat themselves. She needs to get honest with you about her secret desires, which is probably that she can somehow change you into a meat eater because that would be a lot easier for her.

I have to add this. I love my husband very much, and he converted to being a pescoterian for me, plus he respects that our home is Vegan, and he doesn't have a big problem with me raising Will Vegan (although he whines about stupid crap like not being able to buy the baby a hot dog at a baseball game). However, if I would have been Vegan before I met him, I might not have married him, and he is much more similar to me ethically than your girlfriend apparently is to you. This is a MAJOR ethical divide, like a Fundamentalist Christian marrying an Atheist. Can such a relationship be successful? I guess so. But you are definitely adding a level of difficulty to the relationship, and it sounds like this is already a bone of contention between the two of you, and you aren't even married yet. I can't help but scratch my head every time a Veg*n man willingly entangles himself with an omni female when there are so many Veg*n women out there who would love a Veg*n male.

Long post boiled down to one sentence: If you can't discuss this rationally, then you probably don't belong together, and maybe you and her should cut your losses.
__________________
Visit my blog: http://willbearsmom.multiply.com/



Wow - you hit the nail on the head! Yes, I also believes she thinks that if I don’t educate them, they’ll start eating meat when they’re old enough to ask! But at the same time, she’s afraid that our hypothetical children will turn against her family (and her) because they’re bad people, cuz they kill animals and eat them.. I can understand that, but I’m a very ... what shall I say... truth seeking person. I can’t just tell my kids “you can’t eat meat, you’ll get to decide in 7 years from now” - without giving them the reason WHY they shouldn’t eat meat. And I don’t want to hide the facts from them; animals ARE killed every day for the palates of people. They have no choice but to die. They are stacked into piles upon piles and have nowhere to go. And the way they’re slaughtered is not humane whatsoever (if there ever is a humane way to kill something living that is). But of course, you all here know this. I’m afraid my kids growing up not knowing this..

The problem is that I can’t get to the core of this problem without a fight. I try, I try not to scream, to argue, but so far, I’ve had no luck. She feels I’m too... extreme in my beliefs, but then again, I’m passionate about this and it IS a life and death matter for living creatures, so why shouldn’t I be, right?

The analogy to ethics and fundamentalism is an extremely interesting one. Fact of the matter is that she is Christian, and I was raised a Hindu, so there are several things we disagree on. This is just one of them. I know it sounds like we should break up, huh? But we both believe we can make it work. We just don’t know how ... :p

The problem is, you see, I have yet to meet a single veg. female in my life. I’ve met probably 10 girls during my 25 years here on earth and they were all either in a relationship, or not attracted to me (or me to them) - so for me, it’s really hard to find a girl who’s a veg. actually. All my past relationships have been with omni-females. I have no problem with them. It’s when it comes to issues such as this I panic...

[Nocturne]

and the rest...


Pandora9kry

This is a really great, simple, explanatory way of putting it. A bad habit is a really gentle, kind way of explaining meat-eating. Kudos to you!

My boyfriend and I have had the same argument. I want to raise our kids veg, and he thinks that by not having any meat (or dairy) in our home, we are robbing them of the choice to eat these foods. His logic is that if they don't eat them once in awhile as kids, they will lose the enzymes necessary to digest them without feeling sick.

I'm not sure if this is the case for meat, but for dairy, I know that happens. To me, I don't think it's a big deal if they don't feel well after eating pretty unhealthy foods. It shows them what their body really thinks of that junk!!

So far, our compromise is that he will cook a small amount of meat once a week or so, and I won't eat it. I'm not sure how things will go from there.
__________________


Hi!

Your BF sounds like a typical meat-eater, there is no scientific evidence that supports the theory that you can’t survive or digest food without meat. I don’t know about milk, I drink milk myself - lots of it - and I do know a lot of vegetarians out there have to supplement their diets, but I never have. My family, all my relatives, and my ancestors were veg. so I guess it’s different than if you stopped eating meat at a certain age?

But think about it; IF your kids eat meat once a week, they have already tasted it, and I think it’s harder for someone to NOT stop eating meat when they’ve first started, then it is if you’ve never had it in your life (like me). It goes for anything - did we miss the internet before it was invented? Or the cell-phone? But now we can’t survive without these things. I think the same can be said about meat, if you’ve tried it. Or at least, it’ll be a lot harder to give it up!

Marie

Maybe you guys shouldn't have kids if you're already freaking out about how to raise them. Parents should show a united front.. otherwise you'll have kids playing one parent off against the other.
__________________
That One '08



Absolutely agree with you. As I wrote, I feel this is a thing we can’t get out of, it’s too hot to discuss, but so important to me, so I don’t know where we’ll go from here, or what we’ll do...




Diana

I agree with Marie.

But I also think that your relationship with your girlfriend doesn't look like it's going to be a bed of roses. So think twice before having children just because you think having kids sounds like fun.
__________________
Milk is murder.


It hasn’t been a bed of roses at all, I’ll tell you that .. :) I mean, we’ve been together for 3.5 years, and all of those years have been a long distance relationship! But now that we’re finally finishing our studies and have agreed to move to the same city (our city) and move in together, this comes up and I’m like... “have I just wasted 3.5 years of my life?” I’ve had plenty of opportunities to pursue other women, I’ve lived in two countries + 2 places away from our city, but I have always been faithful. I’m a very... “descent” (lol) person - but now I’m thinking I’ve been an idiot if this is the reason we’ll break up.



Ashlend

I have to agree... especially since this is all completely hypothetical at this stage. There is enough in life to argue and fight about without screaming at one another over things that aren't going to happen for a decade or more down the road (if at all.)

As long as you've agreed on the basic thing -- raising them vegetarian -- I would leave the specifics for later. Like another poster said, you have no idea how things will be when your hypothetical kids are 10-12 years old... your girlfriend might even be veg herself by then. Or maybe she'll have a different view on things, even if she isn't.

Not worth breaking up over IMO. But I do think you should examine how you really feel about potentially marrying an omni, because in truth you seem very conflicted over the fact that she doesn't share your values.



Maybe I should start dating you Ashlend? :) Ah, but you’re in the U.S. :p 
Joking aside, yes, I am very conflicted about this. And this is not everything, the fact that she is a Christian and I am not hasn’t bothered me up until now. She talked about having the children attend a church group on Sundays etc. and though I have no problem with Christianity or Christians, I don’t like “organized” religion, and I don’t want this for my kids. Just like with being veg. I want them to decide if they want to attend the Sunday service or not. But this I feel they can do at a much younger age, no?

But as I wrote to another poster, my GF will never go veg. I know this for a fact, I know her that well.. and the fact is that she wants to have kids in 2-3 years, maximum, so the problem is best resolved now, because it’ll be too late when the kid is there and we have to feed him / her. I’m glad we’re discussing these things now, but not so glad the way it has gone down..



Indeorganicveg

I think she's right about their age for the choice. I became a vegan at 11. I mean this in no way rude, but your girlfriend sounds like something.
Why wouldn't you show your children the videos I watched it when I was 11 and I didn't puke or vomit. It was the truth and the truth shall set you free.
You should ask yourself whether you really love her before you make any next level decisions because children are permanent, you can't just erase them or take them away.

Do I love her? I guess.. I mean, love is a feeling that I feel doesn’t last forever. You have your ups and downs and I’m having a down at the moment, so my feelings toward her aren’t that strong. But then there are those moments were she is the best thing that has ever happened to me, her smile, her eyes, the way she curls up to me in bed. I mean, I do love her, even if I don’t so much at the moment :) (Does it make sense?)

But I don’t know about the vids. They’re pretty graphic and she’d probably kill me for feeding them with propaganda (even though it is the truth). She says I’m trying to turn them against her and her family - can you believe that? I watched pretty violent movies when I was 10-12 years old, and I turned out OK (or so I think :) but we’re all different and we react differently to different stimuli, so I don’t know if it’d be a good idea to show vids that could potentially traumatize a 10-12 year old...



Synergy

I can sympathize with your situation.

I had been in a live in relationship for 3 years or so and then became a vegetarian, which added a lot of conflict into our lives. When we discussed having kids, I thought I was being incredibly reasonable saying, I won't feed them meat, but if you want to, have at 'er. He said "fine, we just won't have kids then." What the hell, hey? Basically he argued and argued about it, and it was just a symptom of our underlying values being very different. We had basically just grown apart. I moved out a couple of months after this conversation. 4 years later, I know that was the best choice I ever made.

I've dated a couple of omni's since, and it was just fine because they knew going into it that I was a vegetarian. One of them just assumed we would raise kids vegetarian if we had any, and the other ... well... we haven't discussed it, but I'm sure it'll be a compromise of some kind.

I don't know if this is going to be a deal breaker for you, but a relationship becomes really difficult if someone can't accept who their partner is and what they believe.

Good luck!!!


Thanks for sharing your experience Synergy. As you and some others have pointed out, is that what we really should do, is sit down and have a talk about our values - because, as you say, if our values are so different, it won’t help anything else either. Thanks for the advice, I’ll try that!

[bluesand]

Again, as MRSSHF writes below, the crux is the fact that I can’t tell them why they shouldn’t eat meat

But you could tell them why you don't eat meat and that both mum and dad think its best you don't eat meat until you are 12 and then you make up your own minds .

People change to vegetarian for a stack of reasons Nocturne . Have a friend , his wife was vegetarian , he wasn't . His wife refused to feed their girl meat so my friend said he will feed her meat .
Every time he sat her in the high chair and he went to feed her meat she use to grasp the side of the high chair , pinch her lips and refuse to eat meat . So that got him thinking and reading which in turn , turned him vegetarian .

Had another friend she raised her two sons vegetarian why they were living at home , one carried on , the other rebelled (the other brothers words) and ate meat when he left home .

Its good that you both are moving in , you will find out if you two are going to do the time together long term .

[Nocturne]

But you could tell them why you don't eat meat and that both mum and dad think its best you don't eat meat until you are 12 and then you make up your own minds .

People change to vegetarian for a stack of reasons Nocturne . Have a friend , his wife was vegetarian , he wasn't . His wife refused to feed their girl meat so my friend said he will feed her meat .
Every time he sat her in the high chair and he went to feed her meat she use to grasp the side of the high chair , pinch her lips and refuse to eat meat . So that got him thinking and reading which in turn , turned him vegetarian .

Had another friend she raised her two sons vegetarian why they were living at home , one carried on , the other rebelled (the other brothers words) and ate meat when he left home .

Its good that you both are moving in , you will find out if you two are going to do the time together long term .

Thanks Bluesand. I finally managed to have a "civilized" conversation with my GF about the issue - I don't know if we agree 100% yet, but we decided not to discuss specifics before after we have a kid, so that we don't have to ruin the relationship by discussing purely hypotethical "what-if" kind of situations.

I told her I wouldn't slander her family or her in front of the kids and in return, she agreed she'd make sure no one in her family including her of course, would feed them meat, even when I wasn't there. Also, I realized it's not the "end of the world" if my would-be kid accidentally would swallow a piece of meat - well, as long as he doesn't like the taste at least .. :rockon:

BTW - I mentioned to her that I might go vegan one day, just to test her and then she totally flipped and told me she'd never marry me or have kids with me if I did. Well, so I know that; I told her I wouldn't, but who knows? I just think it sounds really hard to live as a vegan though, no milk and no cheese? No cream and no cake? No pizza? Sounds harsh. No offense to the vegans out there - good on ya' guys!

-n0c-

[KHADIJAH]

Dont have kids with her i say

[froggythefrog]

No cream and no cake? No pizza? Sounds harsh. No offense to the vegans out there - good on ya' guys!

-n0c-


What??? If you're vegan, you can't have ice cream and cake??? Whoa! Nobody told me that! (*Starts shoveling his awesome coconut milk icecreams and deadringer vegan cakes into the trash!*)

If you become vegan, you don't have to miss out on cakes and ice cream. Before you tell me how they taste, try them. I highly recommend this recipe: http://www.veggieboards.com/boards/showthread.php?p=2088546#post2088546 and I recommend you try the coconut milk ice creams that have come out recently. Cheese is hard to duplicate, so pizza won't be the same, but you can still eat pizza too! If you think it'd be horrible to give up cheese, there was a time when I thought it'd be horrible to give up chicken and steak. I guess what I am saying is if you decide you want to go vegan, there's plenty of good stuff out there for you!

[ashlend]

Pizza with no cheese, loaded up with veggies, is sooo good. Soy Delicious ice cream is incredible. And vegan baking rules. I just today made FABULOUS chocolate raspberry vegan brownies, I wish I could share them with all of you.

I'm not 100% vegan, but I keep it vegan most of the time and pizza, ice cream and cake are DEFINITELY still yummy in their vegan incarnations!!

[Nocturne]

Pizza with no cheese, loaded up with veggies, is sooo good. Soy Delicious ice cream is incredible. And vegan baking rules. I just today made FABULOUS chocolate raspberry vegan brownies, I wish I could share them with all of you.

I'm not 100% vegan, but I keep it vegan most of the time and pizza, ice cream and cake are DEFINITELY still yummy in their vegan incarnations!!

Sorry for making the thread into a vegan discussion, but I think the main problem for me would be availability of the items in question. I've never seen coconut ice cream (though I've seen Tofu Ice Cream) and I can't imagine a pizza without cheese, is there a vegan equivalent of cheese? Is it true they use something from the cow in cheese? My friend told me they used something from the cow's intestines to make cheese... :confused:

[Indian Summer]

Sorry for making the thread into a vegan discussion, but I think the main problem for me would be availability of the items in question. I've never seen coconut ice cream (though I've seen Tofu Ice Cream) and I can't imagine a pizza without cheese, is there a vegan equivalent of cheese? Is it true they use something from the cow in cheese? My friend told me they used something from the cow's intestines to make cheese... :confused:
The US Americans/Canadians/Brits on these boards are generally a bit spoiled in terms of availability of vegan convenience / luxury foods. However, I've discovered that Norway is catching up, and last time I was in Oslo I found vegan specialty foods that I've not seen anywhere else yet (Oatly products... though not all of them are vegan due to vitamin D3 fortification).

And yes, there are vegan "cheeses". Many people don't like them, but they taste just fine to me. It's not the same thing, but they're still pretty good. Well, it varies. They are often made from soya beans, but sometimes rice as well.

The cow enzymes which are used in a lot of hard cheeses (especially in Norway) is extracted from the stomach acids of cows. In order to do this, they have to kill the cows first. "Brunost" (brown cheese) does not have these enzymes, but most "hvitost" (white/yellow cheese) does.

Edit: The cow enzymes are called "rennet" in English and "løpe" in Norwegian.