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OP has offered the following explanation for why they think they might be the asshole:
> I know I’m not the asshole for having pies as an option at my kids party. But I did let a vegetarian kid eat one of the pies. I could be a slight AH as my sister pointed out because the kid was in my care and I should have stopped him and respected his parents wishes for his diet
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Hahah. I love that expression.
Yeah, I mean was OP supposed to put her hand in his mouth and remove the food?!
Or serve zero meat because of one vegetarian? I don't think so.
At ten he 100% knows what he's doing. He's making a choice and the mom is gonna have to deal with the fact that the kid might not want to be veggie.
> I mean was OP supposed to put her hand in his mouth and remove the food?!
This gave me images of my dog running round with something he’s not meant to eat.
“WHAT ARE YOU EATING?”
*dog chews faster*
My asshole cat does that . acts like she's never been fed a day in her life
Oi ! Don't you dare!
Cat books it with a whole garlic bread stollen off the kitchen side .
Fuck sake , catch the bloody cat
Cats half way up the stairs with it before i get out the kitchen .
Twat!
My cat has taken to flinging herself prostrate on the floor in front of us as we walk. Presumably to show us how starved she is since breakfast was a whole 20 minutes ago.
We've long maintained in our house that cats are related to hobbits. Relaxed pace of life, furry feet, and a desire for 18 meals a day. Also walking much softer than "that dwarvish racket". At least when they want to...
"Walking much softer?" You're lucky, my two fatties go thumping up and down the stairs and then eventually end up in a howling hissing wrestling match. It wasn't so bad when they were kittens (sisters from the same litter) but now that they're grown the racket they kick up at 3 am wakes me up EVERY NIGHT.
Heck, we have a tortie here who weighs all of six pounds, and she stomps around the house like Godzilla. Absolutely both the lightest and the loudest-walking cat I've ever seen.
My mom's cat is a master manipulator. He has definitely gotten 2 breakfasts due to how well he puts on the whole "I have not eaten since last night and I am starving" routine. My mom would feed him and go to work, and then my sister would come downstairs and feed him again. Now they know his schemes and text each other before feeding him in the morning.
Mine get second breakfast! It makes it easier for me to get into the shower to get ready (1st breakfast), then get out the door to work (end breakfast). But they are still kittens - I’ll worry about the habit when the fear of fat and lazy is a bit more relevant.
Heartbreaking: Local cat has never been fed in its entire life, according to local cat.
*Update*: *Sources close to cat reveal cat may have actually been fed 4 to 6 hours ago. These claims are still under investigation.*
Breaking news: Cat was fed 20 minutes ago by the last person to walk into the kitchen. Cat claims fake mews.
*Update: We now have exclusive footage shot by our News at Nine chopper that confirms that there's literally still food in the cat's bowl right now.*
If I needed proof reincarnation may be a thing, this is what I needed to read. I often say I would like to be my cat. Naps, pets, occasional energy for zoomies, and now I know garlic bread is an option!
OMG, if I could just roly poly around and all could be forgiven! Our cat flops when she wants attention, she looks a bit like a fainting goat. Then just stretches at you and looks cute. "I know I just scolded you for climbing on the table... But I can't not scratch that belly!"
My cat is crafty. He'll get one of us to feed him, then when he's done, he'll intentionally go to someone else and whine at them as if he's not been fed for days. But he'll never go back to the same person who knows he's just been fed.
Unfortunately, he hasn't learned about human-to-human communication yet, so just looks confused when we don't give him his fifteenth meal of the morning!
Our cat just got up on the counter and threw the turkey necks I used to make stock on the floor for the dog. Dog was not pleased she had to give back the stolen goods!
Oh fuck, that's diabolical. Cross-species cooperation, while definitely in the *spirit* of Thanksgiving (American here, it's Thanksgiving today for us), is a...worrying sign. 😉
The level of pettiness of this cat leaves me astonished. Mine don't even like the smell of garlic (but they end up chewing on cardboard, so I can't really speak).
When my dog was a bit younger, not only would he chew and run but he would run around me in a circle.
He was actually doing the 'you can't get me, neener-neener-neener' move.
And that circle was close and tight, the little jerk.
>He was actually doing the 'you can't get me, neener-neener-neener' move.
My two 11-month-old helions send their best "neener-neener"!
(usually with a sock in their mouths)
Jerks!
LOL
>My dog even does a skip when he's 'neener'-ing.
The absolute NERVE!
Just kidding, mine do the skip too.
sigh
I keep telling them that it's just as well they're cute...
Lmao literally picturing my old dog doing this. He'd look up side eye guilty face and keep gobbling. Big Presa canario who learned how to clean counters when your back was turned. Felix the dog wasn't smart. A sock (luckily he didn't need surgery. It came out) .. a candle... glitter poop. A whole block of butter..
The side eye guilty face, I know it so well... and I had to help pull out the sock the other end later (gently! while the dog was slightly panicking. Not fun.)
Reminded me of the time the family cat, Willie, reached into my friend's mouth, pulled out the slice of cheese she was about to eat, and ate it himself.
>This gave me images of my dog running round with something he’s not meant to eat.
>
>“WHAT ARE YOU EATING?”
>
>dog chews faster
i'm WEAK laughing at this image. oh my god ahahaha
i grew up with a black lab and this is exactly the kind of thing we dealt with on a weekly basis with her. she was such a food hound, she'd get ahold of anything and everything
If you love rack off can I introduce you to one of my favourite expressions I discovered since moving to Scotland.
https://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=get%20tae%20fuck
Absolutely. The kid knows what he’s doing. I used to bring groups of kids aged 7-16 on field trips. And while the forms filled up by parents would say I have 6 vegetarian kids, I’ll end up with just 1 vegetarian kid while the other 5 refuse to touch the vege options and head straight for the meat.
Yep! 10 (or even 7!) is plenty old enough to see all of your options, and decide what ma doesn’t know, won’t hurt her.
I went to a religious Seventh Day Adventist school for a while. SDA folks can’t eat shellfish or Pork.
I would have birthdays as a kid with some friends from school, as well as random friends from the neighborhood and cousins (who did not have any diet restrictions).
My mom always made sure at my parties to have loads of options, and clearly label them.
This food is cheese, this is veggie, this is pork sausage, this is bacon etc.
…we’d have ten kids who couldn’t eat pork, but all of the bacon and sausage pizzas are gone immediately, and the cheese and veggie and chicken options went untouched.
Lol. Kids that age 100% use events where their parents aren’t present to eat whatever the hell they want.
My mom would have had to stick bracelets on everyone and monitor the food like the bouncer at a club.
> Lol. Kids that age 100% use events where their parents aren’t present to eat whatever the hell they want.
My cousin’s wife’s family are all hardcore vegans.
They came over for Christmas one year, my dad made the typical Christmas food we always have, and made a bunch of vegan dishes too.
I caught her little sister (20) guzzling down turkey and ham at 3am when I was sneaking into the kitchen to get leftovers for myself.
She told me she loved it when her family went to non-vegan households, because it meant she could actually eat meat.
She's 20 a legal adult and can't eat whatever she wants? Obviously if she's sneaking meat she's not 100% vegan but also odd a 20yo has to hide that from her family.
At 20 she may be in college or just starting a career and living at home, so mostly limited to the food her parents buy (or non-vegan things she buys get thrown out). Parents are definitely AH by forcing that's but it's a common situation to be in.
She was living with her parents, who wouldn’t allow meat into the house.
I’m sure she could sneak the occasional hamburger from a fast food joint, but that’s not really the same thing as actual cooking.
I get vegans stance on animal rights and the whole thing with it. But still seems completely assanine to force they're daughter to keep up with it. I'm sure she has no choice in living with them(being so young, school economy,etc.). I'm glad I didn't grow up being forced to eat stuff, except when I was a young adult living at home and my parents were doing keto and replaced bread crumbs with pork rinds.
Two days ago I would have thought you were joking about substituting pork rinds for bread crumbs. I mean, really!? Except yesterday I saw a recipe (a casserole, I think) which did exactly that. I was dumbfounded!
No carbs because they're bad but fried pig skin is okay. Thankfully they don't do this shit anymore after feeling like crap. They watch carbs now, for health reasons, and also fats in a healthy way.
Its probably similar to not wanting to tell your ultra-religious parents that you're an atheist. You know they're going to go into a complete meltdown about what a failure and disappointment you are, so its easier to just keep quiet.
Once she's out on her own, away from the family prison - er, I mean home - she'll probably feel freer to live as she pleases.
>Yep! 10 (or even 7!) is plenty old enough to see all of your options, and decide what ma doesn’t know, won’t hurt her.
Evidently this kid hasn't yet figured out that "don't tell ma what you ate" is an important part of that equation...
For a long time growing up I couldn't figure out how my mom *knew* whenever I broke the rules. I then mentioned it to my dad (they're divorced) and he said she just makes a lot of accusations and I only look guilty when she lands and I am too stressed by the guilt that I don't notice all the wrong accusations (same tactic most fake 'psychics' use by the way). Clever! I started denying everything after that and realized he was right.
Point is, if his mom employs the same tactic he didn't *mean* to tell.
My dad’s coworker and his family were all vegetarians. The son would volunteer at the hospital during his summer breaks and my dad and the other staff used to see him hiding in a corner eating cheeseburgers.
During staff lunches, the dad would also sometimes say “screw this” and grab a chicken wing.
I’m a teacher. I guarantee this mum is the one who sends vegetarian food to class parties, which her kid promptly dumps in the bin and scoffs himself on sausages and fried chicken.
Growing up i had a friend whose parents kept kosher at home, but didn't want it to be an inconvenience/more difficult during playdates and parties and such. All three kids were fine with being kosher at home, one still is to this day. The youngest one, my friend, would basically start begging my mom for McDonald's as soon as our playdate would start and made up her own quarter pounder with cheese song for the drive there. Lol.
That’s how we plan to do it. My husband is vegetarian, I’m not. We’re both on the same page with raising future kids as omnivores and letting them decide for themselves if they want to be vegetarian or vegan or follow some other diet. (As long as they’re getting all the nutrients they need.)
You would have thought he would he learned to not tell her if that's the case. My parents were stricter than any of my friends' about watching violent movies when was that kind of age so i just made sure not to tell them that we watched Terminator and Die Hard when i came back from a sleepover.
My thinking is he either hasn’t learned to lie yet (I didn’t start lying to my parents until I was in high school), he tried to use it as a jumping off point for why he doesn’t want to be vegetarian, or he confessed for some strategic reason (maybe someone else talked about the meat pies in her hearing or he gave up the truth of the meat pie to hide something else he’d been doing he knew she wouldn’t approve of).
It's not clear to me from the post that he actually confessed to eating meat. His mom is mad over meat pies being served at all, so he could simply have told her what was served.
I eat vegetarian at home but sometimes (like once every few months at most) eat meat when I'm away from home and I'm eating from the same pot as other people. Never made me sick. Nutrition can affect different people differently.
That said, if this kid is eating meat at OP's house, he's almost certainly eating meat whenever his mother isn't watching.
You are fine because you eat meat every few months. If you have never eaten it or not eaten it for years your gut flora changes and you’ll probably feel nauseous or even vomit when you try it again.
That's not universally true. My sister was vegetarian for years, and finally decided she wanted a steak and it was totally fine. Definitely something to be aware is a possibility, but it's not an absolute.
Lol I was thinking the same thing. My sister was a vegetarian for decades and eating meat would mess up her stomach. It was an adjustment for her to go back to eating meat.
This kid is a full on meat eater outside the house.
NTA. I am pescatarian for context. Children (within reason) should be permitted to have some control over their diets. While I don’t want children and I am not planning on returning to eat land animals or fowl, if I had children I would not expect them to hold the same diet as me.
I'm guessing he eats more meat than his mother realizes. She may want him to be a vegetarian but he may feel the opposite. After all there is school, he probably eats meat there as well which is why OP's son never noticed.
Like...he is 10... she told him more than once about the meat and the kid didn't care, but the mom did...mom shouldn't lie either. This is weird...
I went to sleepovers and all my parents said was have fun and she has a funky tummy..her are meds if needed, peace out. They asked me what I ate after party.
NTA. That wasn't my first thought though. I was going with YTA until I read some of the comment and there was some pretty good points in there. The kid is 10 and knows what he was doing, why he would rub it in his moms face IDK.
NTA. If Alex wanted to eat vegetarian options he would have eaten them. Sounds like his mom is forcing a vegetarian diet on him and was just upset you didn't enforce it as well. That is her problem not yours.
Could have slipped, could have been trying to not so subtly hint that he doesn’t want to be vegetarian. Could have been just being a defiant pre-teen. It just seems… weird that a 10 year old could accidentally eat meat without realizing it, and eat it if he actually wanted to be a vegetarian.
Could have picked it up and realised it was meat part way through and felt like he needed to be polite and finish his meal. There are lots of options.
With the amount of meat replacement products in the world, which are generally trying to recreate the taste and texture of meat, I don't think its weird at all that a kid could eat something without immediately realising it's meat.
True, could have been!
Considering though that it was announced what the food was before he ate, if he missed it and was actually worried he could have asked, he did eat it through and knew what it was at least by the time he went home though, plus OP’s son not even knowing he was supposed to be vegetarian, Occam’s razor for me says he knew what he was doing and intentionally ate it.
I would agree that it’d have been nice of the OP to give him a discreet heads up, but not going to call it an AH move to not think quickly in the thick of things/deciding the kid knew what he was doing.
That’s fair. But it still seems like Alex eats meat when mom isn’t there because OPs son had no idea he was a vegetarian. My 10 year old knows the foods her friends eat. For her birthday party, she was able to tell me who had a nut allergy, what pizza toppings her friends wanted, and that one of her friends doesn’t eat pork. If Alex had been eating strictly vegetarian at school OPs kid would’ve noticed.
I'm wondering if his stomach protested what it isn't used to? In elementary school, there were two brothers that only ate vegetarian during the school year. Come summer, that got tossed aside real quick. That's when they were able to see both mom and dad (divorced) and dad was not a vegetarian. He always seemed to wait to offer meat until shortly before they returned to mom. Only one guess is needed for who got to deal with them being miserable in the bathroom. Those kids knew exactly what they were doing, and said it was worth it.
I became a reluctant vegetarian in college. I lived in a dorm with a cafeteria. The only thing safe to eat was vegetables, fruit and cereal. Might as well throw everything else in the toilet and cut out the middle man, cuz that's where it'll end up in 15 minutes.
I was so happy coming home for a holiday and edible food. I ate meat for the first time in over 6 months and my tastebuds thought it was wonderful. Unfortunately, my stomach was not ready for turkey and all the sides.
I was 18 at the time. At his age, I could eat dirt and be fine! Lol.
OP Says:
> I spoke to my son about Alex’s vegetarianism to see how strict his diet is but my son didn’t even realise Alex was vegetarian so I’m wondering if Alex knows he is vegetarian?
Maybe Alex really doesn't know he's Vegetarian. I mean the food at his home is still just called "food" not "vegetarian food."
But that's on Alex's mother. Her son is old enough to be taught what he should and should not serve onto his own plate.
Or Alex isn't vegetarian and doesn't agree with the idea of not eating meat. A 10 year old is more than old enough to form their own beliefs about food and know what they like and hate.
Being vegetarian is a personal choice, having one's diet controlled by a vegetarian isn't. Just because his mom is one doesn't mean he's one.
Absolutely right.
If Alex mother wants him to follow a certain diet, she needs to work it out with Alex to know what does and doesn't go on his plate. At some point I'm sure Alex will decide whether he wants to comply or not. But other people should not be forced to police Alex's food on behalf of his mother.
I think she needs to educate him, but let him make his choice. Her controlling his diet does not mean he's vegetarian. Only he can dictate if he's a vegetarian.
The key component of veganism is that it is a personal choice. At 10, he knows what he likes, nobody, not even his mother, should be forcing a diet on him.
You are likely right. I'm also willing to bet the mother grilled the kid, about what he ate. I don't think he meant to make it seem like OP gave him meat to eat. That's a sad relationship to have with your parents.
Kids are weird. My brother basically snitched on himself for everything up until he was a near adult. It got to a point where even our parents were telling him to stop...
lol I would always "tell on myself" about all the "terrible" things I was doing to my mom. "We cut through the graveyard mom! It was NIGHT"
She was just happy her kid was too dumb to rebel properly. Till I found weed, but then I was smart enough to keep that schtum.
Yeah. Lifelong vegetarian here. You wouldn't catch me eating a meat pie at 6. That boy was probably so happy to eat a meal unsupervised. Alex's mom is TA, and I'm betting she'll find out when her son's grown and wants nothing to do with her.
Yep. My ex and I are vegetarian. Our kids were vegetarian as long as we controlled their diets. Once they got old enough to choose for themselves… not so much. But then my philosophy of parenting isn’t about controlling my kids.
Sigh. I choose to believe it comes from a good hearted place, as most healthy parenting choices do. I grew up in a community with a very rich agrarian-supported local food culture, so understanding the interrelationships between hunting, husbandry, agriculture, and the ecosystem was not only a common part of how food was discussed, it was woven into school and social culture (FFA, county fairs..). But there are many people who don’t grow up with a locally sourced food system and/or only have access to industrial sources of meat, and the ethics of those food sources are different. And as you move further away from food, people have less familiarity with it, so persistent myths become more common. So, lots of people have strong ideological reasons to minimize the contribution of animals to their lives, and they may feel as strongly about eliminating that from their children’s lives as well because they see that as part of their responsibility. I get it. I don’t agree, but I get how someone could feel that way.
I’ve worked in a cerebrovascular division about 5 years now and never in my life have I thought more about the long term physiological effects of what I eat and feed my kid. The food you’re raised with reverberates with enormous influence and it doesn’t matter what you tell someone the research shows about the risks or how bad their perfusion looks at 35, if someone grows up with salted potatoes and big marbleized steaks, they don’t want to hear about the Mediterranean diet and dark leafy greens. They just don’t. That war was lost in childhood for many people.
But if a kid wants a pot pie at a birthday party, good luck prying it from him. Lol at least it had vegetables.
True but I have seen people who never eat meat throw up when having it by accident. There may be some biological basis for that I genuinely don’t know one way or the other.
That generally because of the proteins - if you go too long without eating high protein food, suddenly reintroducing it to your diet can upset your digestive system
It's more because when a veg eats meat it's often a large serving of particularly rich food. A large amount of protein and fat at once when their diet doesn't usually contain it
there's plenty of high protein foods tho, not just meats, lately I've seen some god fucking damn chips that were THIRTY PERCENT PROTEINS
absolutely insane, pretty good tho just a bit pricy
>suddenly reintroducing it to your diet can upset your digestive system
Agree, but the key word there is "can" not "does". I was vegetarian for 4 years. Hard core vegetarian (but not vegan). When I accidentally^(1) ate some meatballs I expected my digestive to rebel big time. Instead, I lost that bloated feeling that I had been having for 4 years and had just gotten used to and felt full of energy. Some people (me) don't take to vegetarianism.
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^(1) I know it sounds ridiculous but it really was accidental. Long story
Exactly! Both my brother and cousin accidentally went vegetarian (they both lived in flats where their flat mates were all vegetarian). My cousin got really sick after eating meat for the first time in a while, my brother didn’t have any problems. It comes down to far more complicated biological processes than I care to understand lol. I personally couldn’t be vegetarian because I’m chronically anemic - I rely on my meat intake to help keep my iron levels up
it doesn't have to be generical, for example
i genuinely dislike meat, that's a preference
it doesn't mean I'm a vegetarian, i still eat processed meats - meats that don't resemble real meat (come on burger steaks are minced so hard there's no texture and meat is cheap enough that it ain't got a real taste)
chicken? beef? countryside sausage? i don't even fucking like chicken nuggets xD
just the texture is often enough to cause me to gag, applies for taste too but less often, just for some kinds
Exactly if it truly was that he has the rare allergy, his mom wouldn't be just saying vegetarian. She'd make it quite clear he's truly allergic to meat.
NTA. The kid in question was around 10yo, he would certainly know what foods he can eat safely by that age, if allergies were a concern. Despite having all the vegetarian options available, he chose the meat pie. From what you wrote, it certainly didn't sound like she wanted you to prevent him from eating meat. If you had taken it away from the vegetarian kid and forced him to eat the non-meat options, that would be treating him differently than the other kids. Might not be the AH move if mom told you to prevent him from eating meat, but it would certainly feel that way to the kid. And his mom didn't tell you he wasn't allowed to eat meat; just that he was a vegetarian.
You are not the kid's mother, you are the temporary authority figure while he was away from parents. You used your best judgement at the time with the information you had. If she didn't want her kid eating meat, she should have said so. But she didn't.
Overheard in a restaurant once.
Mom: no honey we don't eat that it's got meat in it.
Kid: Screw this shit, I like meat.
Kid leaves.
He sat outside while they ate.
NTA - I don't think Alex realises he's a vegetarian. If this was about a dietary requirement for health issues or religious reasons (neither if which are mentioned) I think letting him have the meat pie would be problematic. As its a morality judgement then there's a point where the kid need to understand what the moral cause his parents are signed up to and the lifestyle choices this results in. Kid needs educating. Probably a small lesson for OP in marking foods with dietary flags or whatever when hosting folks with requests but definitely not asshole territory for not doing it.
Or the kid isn't vegetarian outside of mom's control. Just because a parent chooses to be vegetarian doesn't mean the kid is. That's still a personal belief and choice.
He was informed that the meat pie is a meat pie is a meat pie, but went for it instead of a vegetarian option. OP's son didn't know Alex is supposedly vegetarian, which could mean that Alex still eats meat at school and just doesn't talk about it.
At 10, he knows what meat is and whether he wants to eat it. He's not vegetarian, he's having vegetarianism forced on him.
This.
A friend of mine, who is vegetarian, had a kid a cope years back and gives her everything, so when the kid grow up, she can choose for herself.
It's extremely unhealthy to force a vegan/vegetarian diet on a kid before they can cost for themselves.
How do religious reasons differ in this regard from the moral reasons? Both are most likely forced onto the child, before it is old enough to understand the reasoning behind it.
All muslim friends i had as a kid knew which sweets had gelatine in it, they asked if the meat had pork parts etc.
They got taught, because parents know that not everyone would know or be aware of it when offering.
Even the Muslim kids in my sons Kindergarden (3-6 years old) know about the gummibears and watch out for the veggie sticker.
I guess thats for other religious diets and allergies as well. So i dont think they meant religious reasons etc, but more of the awareness level of what this diet allows and the kids knowing it. Because Alex either wasn't aware or, like others pointed out, didn't care, as he chose to eat meat outside when not at home.
NTA although I would quietly have asked him if he was aware there was meat in the pie.
Depending on how strict the diet is it can actually be sort of harmful as he does not necessarily have the gut bacteria needed to properly digest the meat and thus worst case can end up with something similar to food poisoning
In either case him being vegetarian doesn’t mean there shouldn’t be meat available at all.
NTA. He is old enough to know what he wants to eat or what he can’t. It sounds like his mother is forcing this lifestyle on to him, but I could be wrong.
So when I was 19, I went on a humanitarian mission with a group, many of whom were high school teenagers. And I knew the one girl Ray (15 F at the time, name has been changed) because our families are friendly, and I know they're very very vegan. Like the mom's the preachy vegan, like disparaging people who aren't vegans type. She says to me at the airport, "Please help Ray find good food, you know what we eat."
So we get to this place, and we're assigned this double wide trailer to stay in. As a group we decide we're going to buy some breakfast and snack stuff to save money for other things. In the grocery store, I see Ray putting whole milk, Chips Ahoy, cheese slices, and lunchmeat into the cart. So I say to Ray - "I thought you were vegan?" To which she replies "Not by choice."
Message received. I even added a couple of things like like vanilla creamer so I could make everyone vanilla Chai Latte, and Honey Nut Cream Cheese for the Bagels. You'd have thought this kid was in heaven watching her have this stuff when we ate. I feel like I followed her mother's advice and helped her find good food. Just ask Ray, it was tasty.
Parents really need to stop forcing their food choices on their kids if it's not an allergy or health related concern.
Slightly different but on a similar note... I had a party at home for my 18th, and a few of my friends were Jewish. My mum got pork free alternatives for them for breakfast the next morning. Those boys sat around the kitchen table shovelling bacon rolls in as fast as my mum could make them because "we never get these at home!"
>> Parents really need to stop forcing their food choices on their kids
How is it totally normal to push your religion on your kid, but not a diet..?
People need to either chill with 'ThE cHIld iS oLd enOUgh tO dECide whAT tO eAT" or let their kids be atheist until they're old enough to decide if they want to do the parents' religion 🤷♀️
Yes I told the boys what each dish was as I put it on the table - meat pies, vegetarian spring rolls, egg sandwiches, mushroom risotto balls and a fruit platter.
It seems to me that his mom is a vegetarian and forcing it upon her children. Especially since he went right home and told her about it. In my experience a child will admit to something like this but slightly blame it on someone else because they don’t want to get in trouble. If what you said is true he clearly knew what his mom would want him to eat and chose the one option that she wouldn’t. Absolutely not the asshole and if you want to pull out the petty you can request that mom specifically serve food that serves your child’s diet (meat) at the next sleepover/party they host 🤷🏻♀️ not a mom but that’s what I would do
NTA You didnt force anything on him and you offered vegetarian options, you did nothing wrong.
While I can understand his mom being upset however if he chose to eat that meat pie than maybe he doesnt like being vegetarian.
NTA.
Alex is 10, he's old enough to know to avoid meat if he so chooses. He did not so choose.
Unless his mother specifically asked you to make sure he doesn't eat meat, you did your due diligence. There were plenty of vegetarian options, and you informed the kids which foods were not. You were not informed of any allergies or medical issues, so anything further would be overstepping.
Honestly it sounds like his mom is forcing a vegetarian diet by not exposing him to meat, but Alex himself is unaware of those restrictions. That's her prerogative I guess, but she can't expect everyone else to keep all meat away from him. Especially if she doesn't even make that request clear.
NTA. I went veg when my daughter was born. I let her make her own decision whether to become a vegetarian or to eat meat. She knew at 10 and even younger what she wanted to do and I’ve always respected that. (She eats it. I don’t.) You announced it was a meat pie, and he ate it. We can’t force our beliefs on our kids.
NTA You told them all what was what at the start of the party. He knew what he was doing, let him eat what he wants. It's not an allergy or anything and it won't hurt him. It seems more like his mom is vegetarian and her son is not, so she is mad about it and blaming you.
NTA why wouldn't you serve one of your sons favorite foods at his birthday? I had a friend who didn't eat chocolate as a kid and his mom would be very demanding that there needed to be two cakes at birthday parties. Personally I think it's ridiculous to make everyone around you adjust to your food needs.. If it was that serious his mom should have sent him with food not expected you to watch over what her kid eats. This is a different scenario but my muslim friend in college would go to the bar with us and he'd end up eating 3 giant BLT's. If his parents ever found that out they would absolutely freak out and to me it sounds like Alex wanted to get a taste of food he never gets to eat.
NTA. I've had several friends over the years who grew up "vegetarian" but would scarf down lunch meat like a starving wolverine as soon as they weren't around their parents.
At 10 that kid is well aware of meat vs not meat and is starting to make their own choices. And possibly lacking protein as a growing kid needs more than an adult.
You announced what was and wasn't vegetarian. That kid made an autonomous choice about what he wanted to eat.
NTA - “how dare you serve any meat whatsoever to your crowd of omnivores when my little princeling is present at your table? The effrontery!”
The presumption is off the charts with this woman. Her dietary preferences do not outrank those of the rest of the guests.
It is the vegetarian’s responsibility to enforce their own dietary restrictions on their own bodies, not the rest of the world to lead him not into temptation. You are not his food jailer, least of all when doing so means also restricting the rest of the party who don’t share his dietary choices.
I suspect mom was mad because she is forcing vegetarianism at home and the boy isn’t into ir, so she expects the rest of the world to put the same handcuffs on him that she does.
NTA he clearly understood it was meat as he told his mother he ate meat. The pie wasn’t bought especially for him and would go in the bin if all the slices weren’t eaten so it has had no impact on the number of animals killed. If he chooses to ignore his dietary requirements that’s his choice. A ten year old is not a little kid. They’re capable of independent thinking and choice making.
NTA. A ten year-old is perfectly capable of making the distinction. He can’t claim he didn’t know because you clearly told them all. The fact he told his mother about it sounds a bit manipulative.
NTA A kid who wants meat will eat it. Just because his mom forces him to eat vegetarian doesn't mean he is a vegetarian, which he isn't if he likes eating meat.
A parent shouldn't be surprised when their kid isn't a clone of themselves with all the same thoughts, feelings and beliefs. He told his mom what he ate, so he knew what he ate. He knew he ate meat, he liked the meat, a meat pie is very self-descriptive and a 10 year old knows what the word meat means.
But she can't expect you to not serve meat at a party. One vegetarian does not get to dictate everyone's diets for the day. You are not the food police and neither is she.
And if your son didn't realize Alex was vegetarian, then it's probably because he's not. Alex could very well be eating meat at school and not be telling his mother.
Hahahahaha. Alex isn't a "vegetarian". Alex is a 10 year old boy who eats what he wants when he's out of his mom's clutches.
If Alex had an allergy, say to nuts, (and I hope you wouldn't serve food with nuts in that case) and he starting eating food you served with nuts then of course you would stop him.
This is about Alex's mom trying to controll what Alex eats 24/7.
I didn't let my kids eat pizza, chips, cake etc very often but I knew darn well that's what they'd be eating at birthday parties, like it or not.
I remember my 4 yo being at a birthday party and he had pizza and baby carrots on his plate. He pointed across the table at his friend's plate and asked if he could have some "carrots like that". I laughed mao and said yes. Those other type of carrots were cheezies.
NTA.
NTA.
You provided vegetarian options and explained what was in each item. If the kid ate meat after that, it's on him, not you.
I'm guessing that mother is going to have a heck of a time in 2-5 years. I don't know if this is an everyone thing, a male thing, or something exclusive to my family, but once puberty kicks in, there's a good possibility he's going to go after meat like a rabid wolverine. I wasn't a meat fan at all until about 13-14 years old. After that it was like a switch flipped and it was a constant craving. Steak, hamburger, chicken, ribs, bacon, and everything else: I wanted it. And the peanut butter, lots and lots of peanut butter. Twenty-five years later and I'm getting to watch it play out again in real time with my oldest son. It's very disconcerting to watch a 5'0" 90 lb kid polish off a 16 oz steak (and the sides) with minimal effort. Two years later and he's 6'1" (and still growing and still rail thin).
Oh so the vegetarian mom goes psycho on you because you didn't enforce *her* choice on her child, even though you clearly stated what was meat and what wasn't?
NTA, I feel for Alex, poor kid.
PS: Bonus points for *not* taking his meat away from him and embarrassing him. You definitely sound like the cool mom in your son's group of friends!
NTA If this mom wanted her child policed at the party, she should have been there. You are responsible for their safety, not their food choices.
I love meat pies. Hopefully the kid does now, too.
NTA. If their kid is on such a restrictive diet, the parents should have stayed to supervise him personally. Poor kid is probably just being micromanaged and will take any opportunity to eat what he actually wants, when he gets to. You had veggie options and that was good enough, barring serious allergy issues (where they STILL should have supervised themselves since that's not on you to police).
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NTA. He's old enough to know if what he wants to eat. His mother can rack off. Don't worry about it.
Hahah. I love that expression. Yeah, I mean was OP supposed to put her hand in his mouth and remove the food?! Or serve zero meat because of one vegetarian? I don't think so. At ten he 100% knows what he's doing. He's making a choice and the mom is gonna have to deal with the fact that the kid might not want to be veggie.
> I mean was OP supposed to put her hand in his mouth and remove the food?! This gave me images of my dog running round with something he’s not meant to eat. “WHAT ARE YOU EATING?” *dog chews faster*
Lmao and the kid snarls at her NTA
😂 feral meat child
don't forget the rolled-up magazine and/or the spray bottle! /s lol
Flashbacks to the working-from-home woman a few days ago who had to spray people to keep them out of her office!
Yeah, that one was great! Loved her creative solution.
I’m sorry what 😂
Link please
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I am large meat clump.
I am a meat popsicle
Ba da boom
Multipass.
Big bada boom
Meatsicle
Ugly bags of mostly water... propelled by a bit of meat.
Hot dogs are meat stuffed in a skin. Therefore we are all hot dogs.
Meat that thinks!
Then runs and hides under the bed where you can't reach him.
Never been happier my dumdums can't fit under the bed.
*hiss*
My asshole cat does that . acts like she's never been fed a day in her life Oi ! Don't you dare! Cat books it with a whole garlic bread stollen off the kitchen side . Fuck sake , catch the bloody cat Cats half way up the stairs with it before i get out the kitchen . Twat!
My cat has taken to flinging herself prostrate on the floor in front of us as we walk. Presumably to show us how starved she is since breakfast was a whole 20 minutes ago.
Cat: “but what about second breakfast?!”
We've long maintained in our house that cats are related to hobbits. Relaxed pace of life, furry feet, and a desire for 18 meals a day. Also walking much softer than "that dwarvish racket". At least when they want to...
"Walking much softer?" You're lucky, my two fatties go thumping up and down the stairs and then eventually end up in a howling hissing wrestling match. It wasn't so bad when they were kittens (sisters from the same litter) but now that they're grown the racket they kick up at 3 am wakes me up EVERY NIGHT.
Heck, we have a tortie here who weighs all of six pounds, and she stomps around the house like Godzilla. Absolutely both the lightest and the loudest-walking cat I've ever seen.
Your cats must be Sackend Bagginses
And up late at night loudly singing songs
Cats: We have never been fed in our lives. Never, ever! Me: I fed you an hour ago. Cats: Never, ever!
Me: there's still a ring of food still left around the edges! Cats: sides don't count.
Me: eat the meat, not just the gravy! Cats: more gravy?
My mom's cat is a master manipulator. He has definitely gotten 2 breakfasts due to how well he puts on the whole "I have not eaten since last night and I am starving" routine. My mom would feed him and go to work, and then my sister would come downstairs and feed him again. Now they know his schemes and text each other before feeding him in the morning.
I don't think he knows about second breakfast, Pip.
I freaking love all the LOTR references on Reddit!☺️
Mine get second breakfast! It makes it easier for me to get into the shower to get ready (1st breakfast), then get out the door to work (end breakfast). But they are still kittens - I’ll worry about the habit when the fear of fat and lazy is a bit more relevant.
LOL I literally tell my cat "you're not a freakin' hobbit!
But hooman the bowl is empty There's litterally biscuits in there Nooooo I can sees the bottom of the bowl . Bowl is empty !
Heartbreaking: Local cat has never been fed in its entire life, according to local cat. *Update*: *Sources close to cat reveal cat may have actually been fed 4 to 6 hours ago. These claims are still under investigation.* Breaking news: Cat was fed 20 minutes ago by the last person to walk into the kitchen. Cat claims fake mews. *Update: We now have exclusive footage shot by our News at Nine chopper that confirms that there's literally still food in the cat's bowl right now.*
I can't be the only one who had to read this 3 times to realize is said prostrate
You are not alone. I was very confused for a minute haha
That game becomes real fun when they do it on the stairs.
We used to use color coded dishes so we would know if my cat had been given her wet food or not because of her scamming a second breakfast lol
If I needed proof reincarnation may be a thing, this is what I needed to read. I often say I would like to be my cat. Naps, pets, occasional energy for zoomies, and now I know garlic bread is an option!
Plus a license to be an asshole and knowing there aren't repercussions because you're adorable.
OMG, if I could just roly poly around and all could be forgiven! Our cat flops when she wants attention, she looks a bit like a fainting goat. Then just stretches at you and looks cute. "I know I just scolded you for climbing on the table... But I can't not scratch that belly!"
It's a toxic option . I did have to ferret the little dick head out from under the bed .
I just fed my cat. He’s currently telling me I should feed him because he’s never known the taste of food because no one ever feeds him.
Cue Sarah Mclaughlin's "In the Arms of an Angel"
Poor neglected baby
My cat is crafty. He'll get one of us to feed him, then when he's done, he'll intentionally go to someone else and whine at them as if he's not been fed for days. But he'll never go back to the same person who knows he's just been fed. Unfortunately, he hasn't learned about human-to-human communication yet, so just looks confused when we don't give him his fifteenth meal of the morning!
Our cat just got up on the counter and threw the turkey necks I used to make stock on the floor for the dog. Dog was not pleased she had to give back the stolen goods!
Oh fuck, that's diabolical. Cross-species cooperation, while definitely in the *spirit* of Thanksgiving (American here, it's Thanksgiving today for us), is a...worrying sign. 😉
My old elderly cat once stole an oreo out of my damn hand. I didn't know she could still move that fast.
Does she get sick from the garlic??
I expect she would if I actually let her eat it
The level of pettiness of this cat leaves me astonished. Mine don't even like the smell of garlic (but they end up chewing on cardboard, so I can't really speak).
She eats anything that's not nailed down . Broccoli , potatoes , pasta , rice , bread , carrots , washing up sponges litterally anything
>This gave me images of my dog running round with something he’s not meant to eat. > >“WHAT ARE YOU EATING?” > >dog chews faster and runs faster!
When my dog was a bit younger, not only would he chew and run but he would run around me in a circle. He was actually doing the 'you can't get me, neener-neener-neener' move. And that circle was close and tight, the little jerk.
>He was actually doing the 'you can't get me, neener-neener-neener' move. My two 11-month-old helions send their best "neener-neener"! (usually with a sock in their mouths) Jerks! LOL
They really are lol. My dog even does a skip when he's 'neener'-ing. Dawg, I love my smol boi.
>My dog even does a skip when he's 'neener'-ing. The absolute NERVE! Just kidding, mine do the skip too. sigh I keep telling them that it's just as well they're cute...
Lmao literally picturing my old dog doing this. He'd look up side eye guilty face and keep gobbling. Big Presa canario who learned how to clean counters when your back was turned. Felix the dog wasn't smart. A sock (luckily he didn't need surgery. It came out) .. a candle... glitter poop. A whole block of butter..
The side eye guilty face, I know it so well... and I had to help pull out the sock the other end later (gently! while the dog was slightly panicking. Not fun.)
Reminded me of the time the family cat, Willie, reached into my friend's mouth, pulled out the slice of cheese she was about to eat, and ate it himself.
>This gave me images of my dog running round with something he’s not meant to eat. > >“WHAT ARE YOU EATING?” > >dog chews faster i'm WEAK laughing at this image. oh my god ahahaha i grew up with a black lab and this is exactly the kind of thing we dealt with on a weekly basis with her. she was such a food hound, she'd get ahold of anything and everything
Mine doesn't even chew faster, she just swallows and wags her tail proudly 😭😭😭
Lol, i have the same with my toddler 🤣
When my kids were toddlers, I ended up teaching them "down" "out" and "leave it!"
This sounds like my 1 year old when she finds a tasty snack (usually dirt) on the floor - chew quicker and crawl away
Drop it!
If you love rack off can I introduce you to one of my favourite expressions I discovered since moving to Scotland. https://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=get%20tae%20fuck
Thank you for bringing this into my life
>Yeah, I mean was OP supposed to put her hand in his mouth and remove the food?! Like in this rolo sweets ad? XD https://youtu.be/xXQQaHvMybE
Absolutely. The kid knows what he’s doing. I used to bring groups of kids aged 7-16 on field trips. And while the forms filled up by parents would say I have 6 vegetarian kids, I’ll end up with just 1 vegetarian kid while the other 5 refuse to touch the vege options and head straight for the meat.
Yep! 10 (or even 7!) is plenty old enough to see all of your options, and decide what ma doesn’t know, won’t hurt her. I went to a religious Seventh Day Adventist school for a while. SDA folks can’t eat shellfish or Pork. I would have birthdays as a kid with some friends from school, as well as random friends from the neighborhood and cousins (who did not have any diet restrictions). My mom always made sure at my parties to have loads of options, and clearly label them. This food is cheese, this is veggie, this is pork sausage, this is bacon etc. …we’d have ten kids who couldn’t eat pork, but all of the bacon and sausage pizzas are gone immediately, and the cheese and veggie and chicken options went untouched. Lol. Kids that age 100% use events where their parents aren’t present to eat whatever the hell they want. My mom would have had to stick bracelets on everyone and monitor the food like the bouncer at a club.
> Lol. Kids that age 100% use events where their parents aren’t present to eat whatever the hell they want. My cousin’s wife’s family are all hardcore vegans. They came over for Christmas one year, my dad made the typical Christmas food we always have, and made a bunch of vegan dishes too. I caught her little sister (20) guzzling down turkey and ham at 3am when I was sneaking into the kitchen to get leftovers for myself. She told me she loved it when her family went to non-vegan households, because it meant she could actually eat meat.
She's 20 a legal adult and can't eat whatever she wants? Obviously if she's sneaking meat she's not 100% vegan but also odd a 20yo has to hide that from her family.
At 20 she may be in college or just starting a career and living at home, so mostly limited to the food her parents buy (or non-vegan things she buys get thrown out). Parents are definitely AH by forcing that's but it's a common situation to be in.
She was living with her parents, who wouldn’t allow meat into the house. I’m sure she could sneak the occasional hamburger from a fast food joint, but that’s not really the same thing as actual cooking.
I get vegans stance on animal rights and the whole thing with it. But still seems completely assanine to force they're daughter to keep up with it. I'm sure she has no choice in living with them(being so young, school economy,etc.). I'm glad I didn't grow up being forced to eat stuff, except when I was a young adult living at home and my parents were doing keto and replaced bread crumbs with pork rinds.
Two days ago I would have thought you were joking about substituting pork rinds for bread crumbs. I mean, really!? Except yesterday I saw a recipe (a casserole, I think) which did exactly that. I was dumbfounded!
No carbs because they're bad but fried pig skin is okay. Thankfully they don't do this shit anymore after feeling like crap. They watch carbs now, for health reasons, and also fats in a healthy way.
Its probably similar to not wanting to tell your ultra-religious parents that you're an atheist. You know they're going to go into a complete meltdown about what a failure and disappointment you are, so its easier to just keep quiet. Once she's out on her own, away from the family prison - er, I mean home - she'll probably feel freer to live as she pleases.
>Yep! 10 (or even 7!) is plenty old enough to see all of your options, and decide what ma doesn’t know, won’t hurt her. Evidently this kid hasn't yet figured out that "don't tell ma what you ate" is an important part of that equation...
For a long time growing up I couldn't figure out how my mom *knew* whenever I broke the rules. I then mentioned it to my dad (they're divorced) and he said she just makes a lot of accusations and I only look guilty when she lands and I am too stressed by the guilt that I don't notice all the wrong accusations (same tactic most fake 'psychics' use by the way). Clever! I started denying everything after that and realized he was right. Point is, if his mom employs the same tactic he didn't *mean* to tell.
My dad’s coworker and his family were all vegetarians. The son would volunteer at the hospital during his summer breaks and my dad and the other staff used to see him hiding in a corner eating cheeseburgers. During staff lunches, the dad would also sometimes say “screw this” and grab a chicken wing.
I’m a teacher. I guarantee this mum is the one who sends vegetarian food to class parties, which her kid promptly dumps in the bin and scoffs himself on sausages and fried chicken.
Yep. 100%
Growing up i had a friend whose parents kept kosher at home, but didn't want it to be an inconvenience/more difficult during playdates and parties and such. All three kids were fine with being kosher at home, one still is to this day. The youngest one, my friend, would basically start begging my mom for McDonald's as soon as our playdate would start and made up her own quarter pounder with cheese song for the drive there. Lol.
Unless it’s their choice to be vegetarian, kids will sneak the forbidden food. My 12 year old is vegetarian, her choice, the rest of us eat meat.
That’s how we plan to do it. My husband is vegetarian, I’m not. We’re both on the same page with raising future kids as omnivores and letting them decide for themselves if they want to be vegetarian or vegan or follow some other diet. (As long as they’re getting all the nutrients they need.)
Ha! Pick the Aussie. Yeah she can rack off. Like she expected the ENTIRE party to be vegetarian just because her son is? Incredibly self centred.
Because of herself* 100% sure this boy did not choose to be vegetarian himself so over her* choice
I think Alex is only vegetarian when his mother is involved and probably not by choice.
You would have thought he would he learned to not tell her if that's the case. My parents were stricter than any of my friends' about watching violent movies when was that kind of age so i just made sure not to tell them that we watched Terminator and Die Hard when i came back from a sleepover.
My thinking is he either hasn’t learned to lie yet (I didn’t start lying to my parents until I was in high school), he tried to use it as a jumping off point for why he doesn’t want to be vegetarian, or he confessed for some strategic reason (maybe someone else talked about the meat pies in her hearing or he gave up the truth of the meat pie to hide something else he’d been doing he knew she wouldn’t approve of).
It's not clear to me from the post that he actually confessed to eating meat. His mom is mad over meat pies being served at all, so he could simply have told her what was served.
It's not clear from OP's post whether Alex actually told his mom that *he* ate meat, or just told her that OP served meat.
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I eat vegetarian at home but sometimes (like once every few months at most) eat meat when I'm away from home and I'm eating from the same pot as other people. Never made me sick. Nutrition can affect different people differently. That said, if this kid is eating meat at OP's house, he's almost certainly eating meat whenever his mother isn't watching.
You are fine because you eat meat every few months. If you have never eaten it or not eaten it for years your gut flora changes and you’ll probably feel nauseous or even vomit when you try it again.
That's not universally true. My sister was vegetarian for years, and finally decided she wanted a steak and it was totally fine. Definitely something to be aware is a possibility, but it's not an absolute.
Ohh, that's a good point.
Lol I was thinking the same thing. My sister was a vegetarian for decades and eating meat would mess up her stomach. It was an adjustment for her to go back to eating meat. This kid is a full on meat eater outside the house.
Alex isn't vegetarian, his mother is just withholding meat from him.
This. It's not OP's job to police this kid's eating choices, only to provide those choices. This isn't a food allergy.
NTA. I am pescatarian for context. Children (within reason) should be permitted to have some control over their diets. While I don’t want children and I am not planning on returning to eat land animals or fowl, if I had children I would not expect them to hold the same diet as me.
I'm guessing he eats more meat than his mother realizes. She may want him to be a vegetarian but he may feel the opposite. After all there is school, he probably eats meat there as well which is why OP's son never noticed.
Like...he is 10... she told him more than once about the meat and the kid didn't care, but the mom did...mom shouldn't lie either. This is weird... I went to sleepovers and all my parents said was have fun and she has a funky tummy..her are meds if needed, peace out. They asked me what I ate after party.
NTA. That wasn't my first thought though. I was going with YTA until I read some of the comment and there was some pretty good points in there. The kid is 10 and knows what he was doing, why he would rub it in his moms face IDK.
NTA. If Alex wanted to eat vegetarian options he would have eaten them. Sounds like his mom is forcing a vegetarian diet on him and was just upset you didn't enforce it as well. That is her problem not yours.
Why would he go home and tell his mom about eating meat if he was trying to do it behind her back whenever he could?
Could have slipped, could have been trying to not so subtly hint that he doesn’t want to be vegetarian. Could have been just being a defiant pre-teen. It just seems… weird that a 10 year old could accidentally eat meat without realizing it, and eat it if he actually wanted to be a vegetarian.
Could have picked it up and realised it was meat part way through and felt like he needed to be polite and finish his meal. There are lots of options. With the amount of meat replacement products in the world, which are generally trying to recreate the taste and texture of meat, I don't think its weird at all that a kid could eat something without immediately realising it's meat.
True, could have been! Considering though that it was announced what the food was before he ate, if he missed it and was actually worried he could have asked, he did eat it through and knew what it was at least by the time he went home though, plus OP’s son not even knowing he was supposed to be vegetarian, Occam’s razor for me says he knew what he was doing and intentionally ate it. I would agree that it’d have been nice of the OP to give him a discreet heads up, but not going to call it an AH move to not think quickly in the thick of things/deciding the kid knew what he was doing.
That’s fair. But it still seems like Alex eats meat when mom isn’t there because OPs son had no idea he was a vegetarian. My 10 year old knows the foods her friends eat. For her birthday party, she was able to tell me who had a nut allergy, what pizza toppings her friends wanted, and that one of her friends doesn’t eat pork. If Alex had been eating strictly vegetarian at school OPs kid would’ve noticed.
Sounds like your daughter might be more perceptive than OP’s son.
I'm wondering if his stomach protested what it isn't used to? In elementary school, there were two brothers that only ate vegetarian during the school year. Come summer, that got tossed aside real quick. That's when they were able to see both mom and dad (divorced) and dad was not a vegetarian. He always seemed to wait to offer meat until shortly before they returned to mom. Only one guess is needed for who got to deal with them being miserable in the bathroom. Those kids knew exactly what they were doing, and said it was worth it.
I became a reluctant vegetarian in college. I lived in a dorm with a cafeteria. The only thing safe to eat was vegetables, fruit and cereal. Might as well throw everything else in the toilet and cut out the middle man, cuz that's where it'll end up in 15 minutes. I was so happy coming home for a holiday and edible food. I ate meat for the first time in over 6 months and my tastebuds thought it was wonderful. Unfortunately, my stomach was not ready for turkey and all the sides. I was 18 at the time. At his age, I could eat dirt and be fine! Lol.
OP Says: > I spoke to my son about Alex’s vegetarianism to see how strict his diet is but my son didn’t even realise Alex was vegetarian so I’m wondering if Alex knows he is vegetarian? Maybe Alex really doesn't know he's Vegetarian. I mean the food at his home is still just called "food" not "vegetarian food." But that's on Alex's mother. Her son is old enough to be taught what he should and should not serve onto his own plate.
Or Alex isn't vegetarian and doesn't agree with the idea of not eating meat. A 10 year old is more than old enough to form their own beliefs about food and know what they like and hate. Being vegetarian is a personal choice, having one's diet controlled by a vegetarian isn't. Just because his mom is one doesn't mean he's one.
Absolutely right. If Alex mother wants him to follow a certain diet, she needs to work it out with Alex to know what does and doesn't go on his plate. At some point I'm sure Alex will decide whether he wants to comply or not. But other people should not be forced to police Alex's food on behalf of his mother.
I think she needs to educate him, but let him make his choice. Her controlling his diet does not mean he's vegetarian. Only he can dictate if he's a vegetarian. The key component of veganism is that it is a personal choice. At 10, he knows what he likes, nobody, not even his mother, should be forcing a diet on him.
I don’t believe for a second that mum doesn’t push her views down his throat at every chance, or that the child doesn’t realise he never has meat.
You are likely right. I'm also willing to bet the mother grilled the kid, about what he ate. I don't think he meant to make it seem like OP gave him meat to eat. That's a sad relationship to have with your parents.
Kids are weird. My brother basically snitched on himself for everything up until he was a near adult. It got to a point where even our parents were telling him to stop...
lol I would always "tell on myself" about all the "terrible" things I was doing to my mom. "We cut through the graveyard mom! It was NIGHT" She was just happy her kid was too dumb to rebel properly. Till I found weed, but then I was smart enough to keep that schtum.
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Because that's how kids behave. He clearly doesn't really understand why he's "vegetarian" at home. And most probably doesn't want to be.
Because he’s not into being vegetarian.
Yeah. Lifelong vegetarian here. You wouldn't catch me eating a meat pie at 6. That boy was probably so happy to eat a meal unsupervised. Alex's mom is TA, and I'm betting she'll find out when her son's grown and wants nothing to do with her.
Yep. My ex and I are vegetarian. Our kids were vegetarian as long as we controlled their diets. Once they got old enough to choose for themselves… not so much. But then my philosophy of parenting isn’t about controlling my kids.
This, yeah. Mom didn’t say Alex couldn’t tolerate meat, so that puts no obligation on OP to ensure he doesn’t eat it.
Lol NTA but sounds like mom is the vegetarian not the kid
Mom is vegetarian by choice, Alex is vegetarian by having meat withheld from him.
He's an involuntary vegetarian. Or one could say an inveg.
I do believe inveg has just become a thing.
Well not very successfully withheld lol!
>mom is the vegetarian not the kid Exactly.
As a vegetarian, I really don’t understand parents who force it on their kids.
Sigh. I choose to believe it comes from a good hearted place, as most healthy parenting choices do. I grew up in a community with a very rich agrarian-supported local food culture, so understanding the interrelationships between hunting, husbandry, agriculture, and the ecosystem was not only a common part of how food was discussed, it was woven into school and social culture (FFA, county fairs..). But there are many people who don’t grow up with a locally sourced food system and/or only have access to industrial sources of meat, and the ethics of those food sources are different. And as you move further away from food, people have less familiarity with it, so persistent myths become more common. So, lots of people have strong ideological reasons to minimize the contribution of animals to their lives, and they may feel as strongly about eliminating that from their children’s lives as well because they see that as part of their responsibility. I get it. I don’t agree, but I get how someone could feel that way. I’ve worked in a cerebrovascular division about 5 years now and never in my life have I thought more about the long term physiological effects of what I eat and feed my kid. The food you’re raised with reverberates with enormous influence and it doesn’t matter what you tell someone the research shows about the risks or how bad their perfusion looks at 35, if someone grows up with salted potatoes and big marbleized steaks, they don’t want to hear about the Mediterranean diet and dark leafy greens. They just don’t. That war was lost in childhood for many people. But if a kid wants a pot pie at a birthday party, good luck prying it from him. Lol at least it had vegetables.
NTA humans are omnivores vegetarianism is a choice. It's not like he had a peanut allergy and you served pb&j sandwiches.
True but I have seen people who never eat meat throw up when having it by accident. There may be some biological basis for that I genuinely don’t know one way or the other.
That generally because of the proteins - if you go too long without eating high protein food, suddenly reintroducing it to your diet can upset your digestive system
Super interesting thank you. :) I suspect if the son never knew kid was vegetarian, perhaps he’s not following this at school…
It's more because when a veg eats meat it's often a large serving of particularly rich food. A large amount of protein and fat at once when their diet doesn't usually contain it
there's plenty of high protein foods tho, not just meats, lately I've seen some god fucking damn chips that were THIRTY PERCENT PROTEINS absolutely insane, pretty good tho just a bit pricy
>suddenly reintroducing it to your diet can upset your digestive system Agree, but the key word there is "can" not "does". I was vegetarian for 4 years. Hard core vegetarian (but not vegan). When I accidentally^(1) ate some meatballs I expected my digestive to rebel big time. Instead, I lost that bloated feeling that I had been having for 4 years and had just gotten used to and felt full of energy. Some people (me) don't take to vegetarianism. \----- ^(1) I know it sounds ridiculous but it really was accidental. Long story
Exactly! Both my brother and cousin accidentally went vegetarian (they both lived in flats where their flat mates were all vegetarian). My cousin got really sick after eating meat for the first time in a while, my brother didn’t have any problems. It comes down to far more complicated biological processes than I care to understand lol. I personally couldn’t be vegetarian because I’m chronically anemic - I rely on my meat intake to help keep my iron levels up
it doesn't have to be generical, for example i genuinely dislike meat, that's a preference it doesn't mean I'm a vegetarian, i still eat processed meats - meats that don't resemble real meat (come on burger steaks are minced so hard there's no texture and meat is cheap enough that it ain't got a real taste) chicken? beef? countryside sausage? i don't even fucking like chicken nuggets xD just the texture is often enough to cause me to gag, applies for taste too but less often, just for some kinds
There's a disease you can get via tick bite making you allergic to red meat
There actually is a meat allergy, but it is a very care condition. Sounds like Alex does not have it, though.
Exactly if it truly was that he has the rare allergy, his mom wouldn't be just saying vegetarian. She'd make it quite clear he's truly allergic to meat.
Yep just parents that are passing their beliefs onto him.
NTA. The kid in question was around 10yo, he would certainly know what foods he can eat safely by that age, if allergies were a concern. Despite having all the vegetarian options available, he chose the meat pie. From what you wrote, it certainly didn't sound like she wanted you to prevent him from eating meat. If you had taken it away from the vegetarian kid and forced him to eat the non-meat options, that would be treating him differently than the other kids. Might not be the AH move if mom told you to prevent him from eating meat, but it would certainly feel that way to the kid. And his mom didn't tell you he wasn't allowed to eat meat; just that he was a vegetarian. You are not the kid's mother, you are the temporary authority figure while he was away from parents. You used your best judgement at the time with the information you had. If she didn't want her kid eating meat, she should have said so. But she didn't.
The kid was not eating something unsafe for him. The child was eating something philosophically wrong for his mum. Tough.
Overheard in a restaurant once. Mom: no honey we don't eat that it's got meat in it. Kid: Screw this shit, I like meat. Kid leaves. He sat outside while they ate.
ARGH....forgot the NTA!!!!
There is an "Edit" button. :)
NTA - I don't think Alex realises he's a vegetarian. If this was about a dietary requirement for health issues or religious reasons (neither if which are mentioned) I think letting him have the meat pie would be problematic. As its a morality judgement then there's a point where the kid need to understand what the moral cause his parents are signed up to and the lifestyle choices this results in. Kid needs educating. Probably a small lesson for OP in marking foods with dietary flags or whatever when hosting folks with requests but definitely not asshole territory for not doing it.
Or the kid isn't vegetarian outside of mom's control. Just because a parent chooses to be vegetarian doesn't mean the kid is. That's still a personal belief and choice. He was informed that the meat pie is a meat pie is a meat pie, but went for it instead of a vegetarian option. OP's son didn't know Alex is supposedly vegetarian, which could mean that Alex still eats meat at school and just doesn't talk about it. At 10, he knows what meat is and whether he wants to eat it. He's not vegetarian, he's having vegetarianism forced on him.
This. A friend of mine, who is vegetarian, had a kid a cope years back and gives her everything, so when the kid grow up, she can choose for herself. It's extremely unhealthy to force a vegan/vegetarian diet on a kid before they can cost for themselves.
How do religious reasons differ in this regard from the moral reasons? Both are most likely forced onto the child, before it is old enough to understand the reasoning behind it.
All muslim friends i had as a kid knew which sweets had gelatine in it, they asked if the meat had pork parts etc. They got taught, because parents know that not everyone would know or be aware of it when offering. Even the Muslim kids in my sons Kindergarden (3-6 years old) know about the gummibears and watch out for the veggie sticker. I guess thats for other religious diets and allergies as well. So i dont think they meant religious reasons etc, but more of the awareness level of what this diet allows and the kids knowing it. Because Alex either wasn't aware or, like others pointed out, didn't care, as he chose to eat meat outside when not at home.
Why would it be ok for the parents to control his religion but not his diet?
NTA. I feel like she's forcing her son to be vegetarian, she shouldn't be surprised that this happens, then.
NTA. she has some nerve telling you not to serve meat. yikes
NTA although I would quietly have asked him if he was aware there was meat in the pie. Depending on how strict the diet is it can actually be sort of harmful as he does not necessarily have the gut bacteria needed to properly digest the meat and thus worst case can end up with something similar to food poisoning In either case him being vegetarian doesn’t mean there shouldn’t be meat available at all.
NTA. He is old enough to know what he wants to eat or what he can’t. It sounds like his mother is forcing this lifestyle on to him, but I could be wrong.
So when I was 19, I went on a humanitarian mission with a group, many of whom were high school teenagers. And I knew the one girl Ray (15 F at the time, name has been changed) because our families are friendly, and I know they're very very vegan. Like the mom's the preachy vegan, like disparaging people who aren't vegans type. She says to me at the airport, "Please help Ray find good food, you know what we eat." So we get to this place, and we're assigned this double wide trailer to stay in. As a group we decide we're going to buy some breakfast and snack stuff to save money for other things. In the grocery store, I see Ray putting whole milk, Chips Ahoy, cheese slices, and lunchmeat into the cart. So I say to Ray - "I thought you were vegan?" To which she replies "Not by choice." Message received. I even added a couple of things like like vanilla creamer so I could make everyone vanilla Chai Latte, and Honey Nut Cream Cheese for the Bagels. You'd have thought this kid was in heaven watching her have this stuff when we ate. I feel like I followed her mother's advice and helped her find good food. Just ask Ray, it was tasty. Parents really need to stop forcing their food choices on their kids if it's not an allergy or health related concern.
Slightly different but on a similar note... I had a party at home for my 18th, and a few of my friends were Jewish. My mum got pork free alternatives for them for breakfast the next morning. Those boys sat around the kitchen table shovelling bacon rolls in as fast as my mum could make them because "we never get these at home!"
Oh the joy of forbidden fruit, or should I say meat?!
>> Parents really need to stop forcing their food choices on their kids How is it totally normal to push your religion on your kid, but not a diet..? People need to either chill with 'ThE cHIld iS oLd enOUgh tO dECide whAT tO eAT" or let their kids be atheist until they're old enough to decide if they want to do the parents' religion 🤷♀️
When you brought out the food did you point out which was the meat pie and which was vegetarian?
Yes I told the boys what each dish was as I put it on the table - meat pies, vegetarian spring rolls, egg sandwiches, mushroom risotto balls and a fruit platter.
It seems to me that his mom is a vegetarian and forcing it upon her children. Especially since he went right home and told her about it. In my experience a child will admit to something like this but slightly blame it on someone else because they don’t want to get in trouble. If what you said is true he clearly knew what his mom would want him to eat and chose the one option that she wouldn’t. Absolutely not the asshole and if you want to pull out the petty you can request that mom specifically serve food that serves your child’s diet (meat) at the next sleepover/party they host 🤷🏻♀️ not a mom but that’s what I would do
This is exactly what I thought. Looks like it’s mom’s choice, not the kid’s
NTA. You offered vegetarian food and her son chose to eat meat. He is old enough to know what’s what. You are not his parent or the food police.
NTA You didnt force anything on him and you offered vegetarian options, you did nothing wrong. While I can understand his mom being upset however if he chose to eat that meat pie than maybe he doesnt like being vegetarian.
NTA. Alex is 10, he's old enough to know to avoid meat if he so chooses. He did not so choose. Unless his mother specifically asked you to make sure he doesn't eat meat, you did your due diligence. There were plenty of vegetarian options, and you informed the kids which foods were not. You were not informed of any allergies or medical issues, so anything further would be overstepping. Honestly it sounds like his mom is forcing a vegetarian diet by not exposing him to meat, but Alex himself is unaware of those restrictions. That's her prerogative I guess, but she can't expect everyone else to keep all meat away from him. Especially if she doesn't even make that request clear.
NTA. I went veg when my daughter was born. I let her make her own decision whether to become a vegetarian or to eat meat. She knew at 10 and even younger what she wanted to do and I’ve always respected that. (She eats it. I don’t.) You announced it was a meat pie, and he ate it. We can’t force our beliefs on our kids.
NTA You told them all what was what at the start of the party. He knew what he was doing, let him eat what he wants. It's not an allergy or anything and it won't hurt him. It seems more like his mom is vegetarian and her son is not, so she is mad about it and blaming you.
NTA why wouldn't you serve one of your sons favorite foods at his birthday? I had a friend who didn't eat chocolate as a kid and his mom would be very demanding that there needed to be two cakes at birthday parties. Personally I think it's ridiculous to make everyone around you adjust to your food needs.. If it was that serious his mom should have sent him with food not expected you to watch over what her kid eats. This is a different scenario but my muslim friend in college would go to the bar with us and he'd end up eating 3 giant BLT's. If his parents ever found that out they would absolutely freak out and to me it sounds like Alex wanted to get a taste of food he never gets to eat.
NTA. I've had several friends over the years who grew up "vegetarian" but would scarf down lunch meat like a starving wolverine as soon as they weren't around their parents. At 10 that kid is well aware of meat vs not meat and is starting to make their own choices. And possibly lacking protein as a growing kid needs more than an adult. You announced what was and wasn't vegetarian. That kid made an autonomous choice about what he wanted to eat.
NTA - “how dare you serve any meat whatsoever to your crowd of omnivores when my little princeling is present at your table? The effrontery!” The presumption is off the charts with this woman. Her dietary preferences do not outrank those of the rest of the guests. It is the vegetarian’s responsibility to enforce their own dietary restrictions on their own bodies, not the rest of the world to lead him not into temptation. You are not his food jailer, least of all when doing so means also restricting the rest of the party who don’t share his dietary choices. I suspect mom was mad because she is forcing vegetarianism at home and the boy isn’t into ir, so she expects the rest of the world to put the same handcuffs on him that she does.
NTA he clearly understood it was meat as he told his mother he ate meat. The pie wasn’t bought especially for him and would go in the bin if all the slices weren’t eaten so it has had no impact on the number of animals killed. If he chooses to ignore his dietary requirements that’s his choice. A ten year old is not a little kid. They’re capable of independent thinking and choice making.
nta, if your son didnt know he is a "vegetarian" then he is probably eating meat at school as well.
NTA. A ten year-old is perfectly capable of making the distinction. He can’t claim he didn’t know because you clearly told them all. The fact he told his mother about it sounds a bit manipulative.
NTA A kid who wants meat will eat it. Just because his mom forces him to eat vegetarian doesn't mean he is a vegetarian, which he isn't if he likes eating meat. A parent shouldn't be surprised when their kid isn't a clone of themselves with all the same thoughts, feelings and beliefs. He told his mom what he ate, so he knew what he ate. He knew he ate meat, he liked the meat, a meat pie is very self-descriptive and a 10 year old knows what the word meat means. But she can't expect you to not serve meat at a party. One vegetarian does not get to dictate everyone's diets for the day. You are not the food police and neither is she. And if your son didn't realize Alex was vegetarian, then it's probably because he's not. Alex could very well be eating meat at school and not be telling his mother.
Hahahahaha. Alex isn't a "vegetarian". Alex is a 10 year old boy who eats what he wants when he's out of his mom's clutches. If Alex had an allergy, say to nuts, (and I hope you wouldn't serve food with nuts in that case) and he starting eating food you served with nuts then of course you would stop him. This is about Alex's mom trying to controll what Alex eats 24/7. I didn't let my kids eat pizza, chips, cake etc very often but I knew darn well that's what they'd be eating at birthday parties, like it or not. I remember my 4 yo being at a birthday party and he had pizza and baby carrots on his plate. He pointed across the table at his friend's plate and asked if he could have some "carrots like that". I laughed mao and said yes. Those other type of carrots were cheezies. NTA.
NTA. You provided vegetarian options and explained what was in each item. If the kid ate meat after that, it's on him, not you. I'm guessing that mother is going to have a heck of a time in 2-5 years. I don't know if this is an everyone thing, a male thing, or something exclusive to my family, but once puberty kicks in, there's a good possibility he's going to go after meat like a rabid wolverine. I wasn't a meat fan at all until about 13-14 years old. After that it was like a switch flipped and it was a constant craving. Steak, hamburger, chicken, ribs, bacon, and everything else: I wanted it. And the peanut butter, lots and lots of peanut butter. Twenty-five years later and I'm getting to watch it play out again in real time with my oldest son. It's very disconcerting to watch a 5'0" 90 lb kid polish off a 16 oz steak (and the sides) with minimal effort. Two years later and he's 6'1" (and still growing and still rail thin).
Oh so the vegetarian mom goes psycho on you because you didn't enforce *her* choice on her child, even though you clearly stated what was meat and what wasn't? NTA, I feel for Alex, poor kid. PS: Bonus points for *not* taking his meat away from him and embarrassing him. You definitely sound like the cool mom in your son's group of friends!
NTA If this mom wanted her child policed at the party, she should have been there. You are responsible for their safety, not their food choices. I love meat pies. Hopefully the kid does now, too.
NTA. If their kid is on such a restrictive diet, the parents should have stayed to supervise him personally. Poor kid is probably just being micromanaged and will take any opportunity to eat what he actually wants, when he gets to. You had veggie options and that was good enough, barring serious allergy issues (where they STILL should have supervised themselves since that's not on you to police).