I'm with you, Ann. I never liked cold milk & dry cereal when I was a kid. And I didn't like sweet things for breakfast either. Pancakes & waffles never appealed to me. My mom always made something savory for my breakfast on school days. I'm also not a fan of the "just get used to it" club. There's a danger that the sense of deprivation will be so strong that it will eventually undermine any efforts to improve the diet -- all motivation will be lost. I think it's really important, when someone is on a restricted diet of some kind, to find foods that the person really enjoys AND are within the limitations. I think the idea of finding other breakfast foods that your husband can enjoy is a good one. I'm speaking from experience because my husband is on a sodium-restricted diet. Believe me, I work my tail off coming up with tasty low salt versions of the salt laden foods he used to enjoy. Otherwise, he wouldn't be able to stand such a limited diet. Making the switch from half & half to skim milk is probably too drastic. Perhaps just going down one notch to whole milk for a while might be helpful. As others have suggested, a slow & gradual change might be best. Then go down to 2%. That might be a far as you can take it. Once you get below 2% milk, you lose a lot of flavor & texture.

This is the Meatloaf recipe I use: Home Cookin Chapter: Recipes From Thibeault's Table ================== My version of a meatloaf that I had in Magnolia's Restaurant in Charleston, SC. When we got home from vacation I set out to duplicate it because it was the first meatloaf I found that I actually liked. It was different because Magnolia's grilled the slices before serving and it didn't contain ketchup or tomato sauce like so many meatloaf recipes do. 1 1/2 pounds ground veal or mixture of beef and veal 1 small onion finely chopped 1 to 2 cloves of garlic 2 slices Italian/French Bread soaked in milk 2 eggs 1 Tablespoon Dijon mustard 2 Tablespoons chopped parsley 1 tablespoons of dried herbs, (sage and Thyme, a small amount of rosemary olive oil Sauce Green peppercorns mushroons 1 to 2 cups chicken broth . Saute onion in olive oil until soft. Add minced garlic and saute for 30 seconds. Do not brown garlic Soak bread in milk In a large bowl add meat, dijon mustard, chopped parsley, herbs, onions and garlic and mix with hands. Squeeze bread to break up and add milk and bread to mixture. Add eggs. Mix well and season with salt and pepper. Saute a small piece to check for seasoning. Adjust to taste. Shape meatloaf into a rectangle about 8 X 4 x 3 inches high and place in a small roasting pan. Bake for 30 minutes and then add a small amount of broth to the pan to prevent the bottom from becoming to brown. Bake another 30 minutes and baste with the pan juices. Add more broth if necessary. Cook another 10 minutes or until the meatloaf is nicely browned. Let cool and wrap in foil and refrigerate. Reserve pan juices. Make a sauce by adding some green peppercorns and sauted mushrooms to the pan juices. Heat grill Slice meatloaf into 1/2 inch thick slices and grill on both sides until nicely marked and hot. Serve with mashed potatoes

It's ok for children to not eat meat. I know several young adults who have never eaten meat (raised as vegetarians) and they are healthy and strong. There are so many great recipes. Dried beans are a staple of the vegetarian diet, rich in protein and fiber and other things. There are kid things that he probably already likes -- peanut butter, mac and cheese, pizza -- and the possibilities just snowball from there. Just avoid lots of high-fat, dairy rich foods as a "substitute" for meat. There are tons of resources on the internet and in bookstores, even vegetarian cookbooks written just for kids. I'm including a few links. The "go vegetarian" link may seem a bit "radical" but unfortunately what they post is true, if a bit blunt and not what we're used to hearing. Here are some other links: http://www.vegcooking.com/ http://www.askdrsears.com/html/4/T045400.asp this one is about vegan children but a lot of it applies to vegetarian children as well: http://www.andrews.edu/NUFS/Vegan%20Children.html http://www.pcrm.org/health/veginfo/veg_diets_for_children.html http://www.vegsoc.org/info/childre2.html Lots of veggies/grains are a good source of iron... I don't know what your son needs but here's a partial list: http://www.bloodbook.com/iron-foods.html#Foods%20Rich%20in%20Iron or if that doesn't work, try http://www.bloodbook.com/iron-foods.html and scroll down. And here's an article on the difference between heme and non-heme iron: http://www.healthcastle.com/iron.shtml it's not as bleak as it sounds. If you have a supportive doctor, I would talk to him about your son's anemia and the best way to address it. I don't know anything about it but it's possible that iron supplements may be enough to cover any concerns about the lack of meat-based iron. As you can see, there's plenty of information available! It's kind of hard to start suggesting specific recipes because I don't know what your sons like/dislike but if you google things like "vegetarian children" and "vegetarian recipes" you'll be swamped with ideas. If you have other questions, please post away... this forum is a bit slower than some of the others but there are people who read here and will be glad to help. Good luck, and enjoy! Here is a link that might be useful: go vegetarian

Dan The human body is not designed for processing meat--that's why most of our teeth are blunt--for grinding and chewing on fruits and veggies. This is why doctors recommend not introducing meat into a child's diet for the first six months to a year; because their stomachs are not srong enough to learn to process it yet. People that do eat meat usually eat it on a regular basis; and they have been doing so since early childhood. Their bodies have been conditioned to accept the meat and process it to the best of their abilities. They have trained their bodies to process the meat through gradual introduction, followed by consistent consumption. Once meat is removed from a diet, especially for an extended amount of time, the body loses some of its ability to process it--the system's not used to it anymore. The degree of illness experienced when meat is suddenly re-introduced varies from person to person. A few factors to consider are: 1)how long has meat been absent from the consumer's system, 2)was that person a rigid vegetarian who read every label to check for animal broths and fats, etc., and, 3)how much meat was ingested? The degree of the reaction also depends on the sensitivity of the person's stomach, too--whether it is prone to reject spicy stuff or stuff with too much fiber; or if they started out with a relatively hardy constitution. I know that personally, I have a pretty strong stomach. I rarely have any funky reactions unless someone has accidentally (or spitefully!) slipped me food that was tainted with animal products. I get pretty sick even if I eat portabellos that are grilled on the same grill where meat has been cooked (if it isn't well-cleaned!). But then I haven't had any meat, animal fat, or broth or anything for several years (I do still consume a small amount of cheese; and sometimes I will eat cake that was baked with eggs; so I fortunately have few reactions to dairy!). I have also read that the body does react the same way when dairy is removed from the diet. Generally, our bodies were not intended to process any milk other than what our own mothers have produced for us. But after that supply dries up, we no longer need to get the nutrients provided in breastmilk from breastmilk because our bodies are strong enough to eat the foods in which those vitamins and nutrients naturally occur. Apparently we should all be lactose-intolerant; but I suppose our bodies just follow the same conditioning as it does with meat consumption. Anyway; I hope that that novel has helped you understand why you probably had stomach cramps! When that happens to me, I find that eating dry toast with a glass of water helps to alleviate the stress. Sometimes even the water alone helps to flush the meat from your system. I hope you find some of this helpful!!! Melissa