Here are some warning signs that your Vegetarian/Vegan baby is not thriving. Like I mentioned in my previous post that I will be doing a series on why this diet is not optimal. When you are raising young “veggie” children you may be doing them permanent damage.  They are developing brains, hormones, bones, cells, nervous systems. There are consequences when nutrition is not optimal, especially when these children are fed MSG fake soy foods and other unfermented soy foods from conception.

I have close friends who are raising vegetarian and vegan children. It is my experience that children on these diets do not thrive. I have compiled a list of failure to thrive signs that I have observed from children following this kind of diet.

Signs That Your Vegetarian and Vegan Child Is Not Thriving…

• Colic and crankiness (my daughter suffered from this until we removed soy from our diet at 1.5 years old)
• Pale Skin with dark circles around the eyes (my daughter had this)
• Underweight (my daughter was diagnosed as underweight and failure to thrive)
• Overweight
• Constantly Hungry
• Speech Problems
• Behavioural problems (not just ordinary baby/toddler/child behaviour but behaviour that would lead you to think of autism or autism spectrum disorders)
• Developmental Problems (late rolling, sitting, walking and talking)
• Learning Problems
• Moody or lethargic (does not smile, play or laugh as much as other children)
• Candida Yeast infections
• Bloating and Gas
• Dental Caries and Decay, Crooked Teeth, Teeth with spaces and gaps in between
• SMALL teeth (I noticed a VERY BIG difference in teeth size in my vegetarian baby and her sister who had a more nourishing pregnancy. My veggie baby #1 had small teeth while baby #2 has very big strong teeth). My baby #1 has adult teeth that are growing in and they are much bigger. She has lost two baby teeth that are being filled in by only one tooth.
• Poor eye health
• Sleeping too much or sleeping too little (this is hard to detect among babies and toddlers as they naturally don’t sleep very well. But my vegetarian daughter was an extremely light sleeper and would wake as soon as she realized that I had left her side. My friend has the opposite problem as her children sleep more than normal kids their age. I guess my point here is to notice if your child’s sleeping patterns are different from others in their age group)

There are many reasons these symptoms occur. I will explain further as I write more in this series.

There is a great difference between adults becoming vegan and children born from vegan/vegetarian pregnancies. There are essential vitamins, fats and nutrients that are needed for proper development of the fetus and a growing baby. You cannot get a lot of them on a vegetarian diet.

Disclaimer: as a former long term vegetarian and vegan I have had some health issues. This is article is coming from my own health research and experience and is not meant as medical advice.

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My daughter was only 1.5 years old when she started to get cavities in her two front teeth. We were vegetarian/vegan at the time. The cavities resulted from a high carb diet rich in soy and refined
grain products. I was pretty devastated at time because all my effort was going towards raising her in a healthy way. However she was definitely not thriving. Her weight was low, she was pale, her teeth had big gaps in them and now her teeth were starting to rot. She was high needs as well and cried all the time. I was wondering how a child could be so miserable when there was nothing to be miserable about.

Childhood Dental Caries Can Be Healed!

I started looking into the dental caries and discovered traditional foods. Traditional foods are a foods prepared the way our ancestors have prepared foods in just recent history before the commercialization and industrialization that we know so well today. Traditional foods are prepared in such a manner as to get the most nutrition out of a particular food.

For example:

• Grains, nuts and seeds are sprouted or soaked to make them more digestible and to release and neutralize phytates that inhibits mineral absorption.
• Foods are preserved by fermenting which aids in the healing of the digestive system (sauerkraut, pickles, fermented salsa).
• Organ meats are a prized food and cherished for the nutritional value.
• Animals are fed food that they thrive on and allowed to pasture and eat insects which allow for their meat to have more nutritional value.
• Eating of raw animal products (meat, milk, egg etc.) Pasteurization and cooking of our food has killed many beneficial enzymes and denaturing proteins.
• Also the removal of fats has drastically decreased our absorption of fat soluble vitamins such as Vitamins A, D, E and K which are essential for immune, brain, bone and eye health. Low fat diets are dangerous because of this very fact.

Traditional fats are saturated fats. They are heat stable and don’t go rancid very easily and therefore they are the preferred fats to use for cooking. They also make food taste delicious and more nutritious!

So we took the soy and refined grains out of our diet and replaced them with traditional foods. This is what
healed the cavities!

We did not even use toothpaste on our daughters teeth for the first 3 years of her life. No fluoride either! Just pure nutrition.

To your health and wellness,

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There is a poison in your kitchen and you may not even realize it. It has many names and is even in health foods and organic foods. It goes by the name monosodium glutamate (MSG) but can hide under names such as natural flavours.

What is up with that?

MSG It is a known neurotoxin and yet it is approved by the FDA.

The bouillon cube used to make a healthy soup is loaded with MSG just to make it taste good. MSG kills brain cells AND damages DNA! But don’t be fooled if the ingredient list does not contain monosodium glutamate. This dangerous ingredient goes by many other names. Even the organic stock cubes contain MSG! It is called yeast extract. You can find the the hidden names it hides under here at msgmyth.com

I no longer trust any packaged food.

Organic, shmorganic – all the lies in the name of good taste and profit. And also found at your local health food store!

MSG is an exitotoxin. That means that this ingredient is able to stimulate and excite the cells to such an extent that they die. This class of food ingredients are addictive and is far worse for your health than smoking, drinking and drugs.

The food manufacturers even put MSG in baby formula! The culprit ingredients are processed milk ingredients and soy protein. Neurosurgeon, Dr. Russell Blaylock says that children are 4 times more sensitive to these ingredients than adults!

When children are exposed to MSG early in life their tastes change and crave these horrible foods. Sugars and processed carbs become the preferred food group in their diet.  Have you ever met a child that says they hate vegetables??? That is pretty common these days.

This change in tastes is what can cause obesity. Dr. Blaylock describes this kind of obesity that is impossible to get rid of with diet and exercise because of the way it alters the brain.

One of the biggest LIES that I fell for, was that fake soy veggie meats are healthy. I ate them throughout my first pregnancy and fed them to my daughter until she was a toddler. Well you might as well just call them MSG meats. Growing and developing babies, growing and developing cells do not need to be exposed to cell toxins. The culprit MSG ingredients found in these foods are Hydrolyzed Soy Protien, Isolated Soy Protien, Yeast Extract, Carrageenan, Natural Flavours, Flavours. All six of these ingredients can be found in just one veggie meat product!

My daughter was extremely colicky and high needs while we were vegetarian (till she was 1.5yrs old). She cried and cried and I cried with her. It could have been for many reasons but her behaviour changed once the processed veggie food and soy milks were out of our diet.

Aspartame is also an exititoxin. It is found in many diet foods, diet sodas and sold in the artificial sweetener section of your grocery store.

Humans are the most sensitive to exitotoxin than any animal. We are 5 times more sensitive to exitoxins than a mouse (who is the next most sensitive animal). Like stated earlier, babies are 4 times more sensitive than adults. During pregnancy, MSG can pass through the placenta and damage the brain of the baby! During pregnancy the baby’s brain has not fully developed yet.

Just one dose of MSG can suppress the immune system for the lifetime of an animal. And human adults are 5 times more sensitive than animals. And babies are 4 times more sensitive than adults. The immune system of that baby can be destroyed by MSG.

MSG is a neurotoxin and we can’t forget that it has an impact on our intelligence. Dr. Blaylock explains that our MSG exposed children may look normal and test good in the lower grades when they learn simple strategies but impairment occurs when they reach higher levels of education and learn the more complex strategies. With exposure to MSG there is an 80% reduction in the size of the neurotransmitter called acetylcholine and this neurotransmitter is essential for learning and memory. Norepinephrine is also a neurotransmitter that is damaged. Norepinephrine is used for concentration and if our children can’t concentrate than they will have a lot of trouble with learning.

There is a huge social cost to the poisoning of our society. Our kids have behavioural and learning issues, our parents
have dementia, and the adult population suffers from chronic illness.

Here is Dr. Blaylock exposing the lies and dangers of exitotoxins…. This is a fantastic presentation and well worth the hour to listen to it. It could explain some health issues and concerns that you may have.

To your health and wellness,

Catherine

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Last week I took the kids and myself to the dentist. The kids normally have a checkup every six months, but I was a bit nervous about this appointment. You see I also made an appointment for myself. I have not seen a dentist since I was 12 years old – that was 20 years ago! Everything went well and no cavities in any of us so far.

My eldest daughter Aliena has had some issues though. When she was a small baby she developed small black pits in her front teeth and white discolourization in some others. I was concerned because she also was classified as failure to thrive and was losing weight. We were vegan at the time (due to milk and egg allergic skin reactions in Aliena) and I had a vegetarian pregnancy.  I was very concerned about her growth. [Read more →]

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