Hey everyone, I’m Tümay, and here at SwitchLife.blog I’ll be writing about eco-friendly, vegan, dairy-free and organic products.
My Story – How I made the switch
I am a professional graphic designer and a web developer with over 10 years of experience. When I first started in the industry, I had to do whatever it took to get new jobs. At the time, being someone with no experience made it very tricky to land new projects. Over the years I gained a lot of experience, I worked with many big companies and in various industries – and yes, some of the jobs I completed started questioning my conscience. Like for example when I first designed a website for a milk company, I didn’t feel bad about it. But as I dived in deeper, I started to gain some awareness and became conscious of the unethical practices. That’s when I first felt the desire to switch my lifestyle.
I started being picky about projects
The first thing I did was to be picky about new jobs I accepted, and of course it didn’t end up well. Being in a such competitive market, it’s not practical to reject high paying jobs just because you don’t want to do them. But still, I managed to find alternative ways to earn money.
I switched to using organic, cruelty-free and non-chemical products
During my wife’s pregnancy, I decided to only buy organic products as much as possible. Also making sure they were free of toxic chemicals and of course, cruelty-free products. After all our health was more important than a few extra bucks. I started to become more aware of the things I used to buy, and what they contained, studying the ingredients more than ever. It became apparent almost immediately that this was the best switch I’ve ever made, and there was no turning back.
I switched to a dairy-free diet
When my son was 8 months, my wife’s maternity leave was over. Turning to his food, the easiest method, and the one recommended by our doctor, was formula. Mainly because he was only breast-fed for the first 8 months and he couldn’t eat real food yet, so we did that. We purchased one of the best formulas we could, and sadly, our first try ended up in hospital. Soon after he was fed, he had trouble with breathing and his face was swollen, that was a harrowing day for us.
So, from that day onwards, we decided to get a blood test done to see what he’s allergic to. Turns out, our son had a milk and egg allergy. This would also explain the non-healing rashes he was getting even though we were applying rash creams. The reason was because my wife was consuming dairy products. The cow milk proteins passed to the breast milk, and then onto him by breast-feeding, which made him sick.
That’s when we decided to switch to a dairy-free diet for good. He’s not a baby cow after all, and I believe he wasn’t supposed to drink cow’s milk in the first place.
What do I do now?
My son is almost 2 years old now, he still has the same amount of allergy – if not worse. We are doing a drop test every 4 months to see if his allergy still exists. I and my wife are discovering new vegan recipes and/or adapt existing recipes into vegan using almond milk and egg alternatives.
And I will be sharing my experiences, recipes, product reviews with you on SwitchLife.Blog
