archive.today • How Owners Are Putting Their Pets on Human Diets - The New York Times

Karl Malone starts his day with a breakfast that includes ashwagandha root and psyllium husk powder. His dinner is always seasoned with ground turmeric, and then he takes his joint supplements. He goes on two brisk walks daily and avoids restaurant food, as his doctor recommended he lose weight.

Karl Malone is a dog — an 11-year-old sandy-brown Australian shepherd mix.

[...]

The market for what the pet-food industry calls "nutritious pet food" — higher-priced products that claim to contain premium or nutritionally enhanced ingredients — is expected to reach $17.9 billion by 2026, according to a report last year by Pet Insight, an independent analytics company. Pet wellness in general has become an even bigger industry, and has spawned a subset of social media influencers and Facebook groups devoted to refining the diets of all kinds of domesticated animals.

This sentence annoyed me: "Vegetarian diets, he said, are not suitable for most cats because they need animal protein, but can be acceptable for dogs." For NYT pet articles are the words obligate carnivore now taboo?

  • sappho [she/her]
    ·
    3 years ago

    My cat eats gluten-free, because I'm celiac. If she eats something with wheat in it and then grooms herself or licks me, then that contamination can eventually give me a reaction. If she drops food on the floor and I have to clean it, if I miss a bit or use the wrong sponge to wash her dish, I can be contaminated. Cats shouldn't be having grains anyway, they're only in cat food because they're cheap. I am so sick of people lumping in gluten free with voluntary diet modifications like going vegan. It's not the same thing.

    • thisismyrealname [he/him]
      ·
      3 years ago

      my grandma is celiac and was misdiagnosed as having lupus for about a decade. my family says she was a completely different person; apparently it affected her memory and stuff too. she's better now thankfully

      hope you're doing alright

      • sappho [she/her]
        ·
        3 years ago

        Thanks ❤️ It's a pretty brutal disease but it goes undiagnosed a ton because doctors aren't informed. Sorry to hear about your grandmother; I also had symptoms from neurological damage before being diagnosed, but many don't even realize that's a possible consequence of celiac. I really had to fight to get tested. The bright side is that it's the one autoimmune disease that can be fully controlled by lifestyle changes. I'm doing so much better now, a year or so since my diagnosis.

      • sappho [she/her]
        ·
        3 years ago

        I'm 100% on board with a mandatory veganism society as long as we also fix the labeling requirements and cross contamination standards in food/supplement/medication manufacturing for gluten. Being a celiac here in the US is suffering