Help
I have a 17-year-old son. He is autistic and he is a passionate vegetarian. Without further knowledge, he was OK with eating eggs and dairy not understanding that those animals eventually end up dead. He just learned that today and no longer wants to consume any dairy or egg products. Here’s the problem, he is 6 feet tall under 120 pounds and losing. He has eating challenges and the dairy and eggs are really the only things that are keeping him alive at this point. He can’t stand the feeling of oily food in his mouth, but he desperately needs the fats. Non-fat yogurt, cottage cheese, and eggs are staples. It would be virtually impossible for us to make an overnight shift to an all vegan diet. He cannot afford to even miss one meal. He is barely medically stable, with bradycardia and less than perfect labs (we are under the watchful eye of an eating disorder doctor). There’s no way he’ll switch to food that he does not like just to get the calories in. He’s a very picky eater at this point.
Oh, the most fun he has in life right now is making ninja Creami s with high protein milk.
He is just crushed at the moment.
Advice? I am not vegan and am burned out trying to keep him alive. I do not have the time or mental capacity to find vegan foods that will replace his vegetarian, but not vegan foods. I have been with him 24/7 for about 26 months straight… these eating challenges are brutal….. he also has gastric and pelvic floor issues severally compounding it challenges…he has a good team of professionals, but nobody that he would listen to to help navigate this new knowledge and sudden loss of all his favorite foods.( No one that could understand his moral beliefs.)
My son has had a very rough last 3 years and has nothing to live for at the moment (once healthy, he has runs if f potential - he is smart, atheistic, loves to learn) he currently did not have that drive to stay in this world and today the world became a bit more cruel.