Midwife Turns Down Pregnant Vegan, Tells Her to Go Paleo

Expectant mother Brittany Davis, 30, was shocked after a midwife refused to coach her through her pregnancy and delivery because of her vegan lifestyle. Davis found the local midwife, who specializes in at-home births, online and arranged to meet her. When they met, the midwife started questioning her intake of protein, vitamins, and calcium after discovering that Davis maintained a plant-based diet. “I quickly shut the conversation down and told her I didn’t have any more questions, to which she replied, ‘I’ll really have to think about working with you; I’ve worked with vegans before and they just didn’t cut it,’” Davis told media outlet Metro. Davis received a text message from the midwife the following day explaining she was uncomfortable with her plant-based diet and would only help if Davis began eating animals products. The midwife wrote: “Hi Brittany. Thought carefully about us working together … thinking we might stress each other out with ‘veganism!’—if you could find [the] will to return to classic—maybe paleo diet even—it might work. I’m of the mind that you are building ‘an animal of sorts’ and need animal protein—especially during pregnancy! And you starting off with ‘weak blood’ by my standards … Blood is the river of life!! Let me know if you want to talk further … I enjoyed meeting you and Garrett!” Davis, who also has a two-year-old vegan son, was mortified. “So how could I have lived this long and become pregnant again if we were so deficient in these important things needed for development?” she said. “All I’d say is that she should have researched more before shooting down the idea of working with a vegan entirely to try and get a better understanding of it.”