Resources for vegetarian kids?!
However, I'm concerned that he's not consuming enough calories to counter the activities he's doing. He's started becoming tired more quickly lately, and while I know this can just be due to developmental changes, I'd like to do a nutrition/fitness unit with him to help him gauge how much he should eat per day and what amounts of nutrients, carbs, proteins, fats, etc. that he needs.
He's one of those people that just gets so involved in whatever he's interested in at the moment that he forgets to eat. By helping him focus a bit more on this, I'm hoping to make it interesting and fun for him to try new things and pay more attention to what (and how much) he eats.
Answers: My 10yo son has been a vegetarian since last summer, and while he's doing really well with it, his activity level has gone up a lot in the past month or so. He's working toward earning some fitness-related badges in Scouts and has started designing structured workouts for himself (cycling, swimming, hiking, etc.).
However, I'm concerned that he's not consuming enough calories to counter the activities he's doing. He's started becoming tired more quickly lately, and while I know this can just be due to developmental changes, I'd like to do a nutrition/fitness unit with him to help him gauge how much he should eat per day and what amounts of nutrients, carbs, proteins, fats, etc. that he needs.
He's one of those people that just gets so involved in whatever he's interested in at the moment that he forgets to eat. By helping him focus a bit more on this, I'm hoping to make it interesting and fun for him to try new things and pay more attention to what (and how much) he eats.
Hi, thank you for being so supportive of your son.
One good site is "Vegetarian Diets for Children: Right from the Start." It describes the veg foods groups and at the bottom, there is a meal planning chart for vegetarian kids 7-12 years old:
http://www.pcrm.org/health/veginfo/vsk/c...
This site has some healthy lunch box foods for veg kids:
http://www.vegcooking.com/backtoschool.a...
Also, here are recipes with nutritional analysis:
http://www.pcrm.org/health/recipes/recip...
Vegetarian foods high in protein, iron, and calcium:
http://www.tryveg.com/cfi/toc/?v=08sourc...
Hope this helps!
I can answer you from my own experience. I was born as a vegetarian. My whole family back home in India are vegetarian. I was an athlete back in school. Its been more than a decade since I came to this country. I am chef too. Anyway, I saying all this to tell you that I can tell you from practical knowledge what is good for your kid.
If he likes milk nothing like low fat Organic milk fortified with DHA. Give him kids friendly vitamin supplement. Make interesting food with a mix of rice for carbs, starchy foods, different types of lentils, dairy products, green leafy vegetables and other veggies. Add spices to it. Spices are good for health. They help to improve your immune system. Make the food taste and look good. Ultimately taste is what matters. Take an innovative and healthy approach when it comes to snacks.
http://www.petakids.com/
all kindsa fun stuff and resources for veggie/vegan kids!
This site is for young veggies. It has a lot of articles that help young people, as well as a lot of articles by young people so its quite an active community.
Its managed by the vegetarian society so you can trust the content to be monderated correctly.
If you yourself are interested in learning alongside him, perhaps you can try the veggie societies main site, it has pages for parent of new veggies, as well as in depth info about nutrition and recipies.
The main site:
http://www.vegsoc.org
Look at the "lifestyle" menu - it has the other topics i mentioned
The general store of all nutrition pages is at here:
http://www.vegsoc.org/info
Its great that you are supportive, best of luck with it.
me: veggie for 28 years since i was 14. Absolutely no health or nutrition issues at all.
The above site will help you when you see statements like "watch protien levels" or " you need supplements" etc. These statements are not true adn there are plenty of those myths around
Sounds like you have a son with a good head on his shoulders, and a very supportive mom.
It looks like you got some great links for the others. I just wanted to add my two cents about sports/activities. I've been veg since i was about 8 and have also always been extremely active. I was on the swim team in high school/college and I cycle a lot now. The foods in a veg diet are probably the healthiest he can eat for what he's doing. The one thing to remember is when he's cycling/hikig ect to make sure he gets extra carbs before during and after.
Good luck.