A mum from Hampshire has credited her youthful looks to following a vegan diet, and has claimed people often mistake her for being ‘at least 10 to 15 years younger’ than her actual age.
Although she has admitted to having ‘good genes’, 37-year-old Alice Austin-Grant has largely attributed her fresh faced appearance to a plant-based diet, which she believes has given her bags of energy.
It reportedly isn’t just Alice who has reaped the benefits of a vegan lifestyle. The mum-of-three’s dog, a 10-month-old chihuahua named Diesel, was weaned off meat at eight weeks old and is said to be the picture of health.
Little Diesel reportedly ‘loves tofu’, with other favourite treats including specially-made kibble, seaweed treats, tofu, couscous and pasta.
Proud dog owner Alice has credited Diesel’s meatless meals for his ‘glistening’ coat, energetic disposition and ‘lovely’ breath. She also claims the pint-sized pooch has never passed ‘horrible stinky farts’, unlike other meat eating dogs she has reportedly owned.
According to Alice:
I’ve only just joined the gym now and people always comment that I am strong and thin and that my skin is really good, which I credit to my diet. I look a lot younger than I am too. People usually pitch me at least 10 to 15 years younger.
I do have really good genes from my mum but it’s largely down to diet how much energy I have and that I don’t need to drink as much coffee as I used to.
In the sunlight Diesel’s coat just glistens. It looks like glitter. He’s very, very pretty with his long fur and his coat just catches the light and glistens.
After adopting Diesel, Alice didn’t feel comfortable with feeding him ‘gristle and fat’, and did ‘a lot of research’ into whether or not a dog could remain healthy on a meatless diet:
I started to find a lot of information that found that dogs do far better on a vegan diet than a meat diet because of the amount of processing it takes them to digest meat. You smell dog food and it smells appalling before you’ve even put it in the dog.
A dog, naturally, isn’t going to end up with a salmon every day, so for them it is far more natural to have a primarily vegan diet. I used to own a rottweiler years ago and, my goodness, he used to wake himself up from farting it smelled that bad.
Whereas Diesel doesn’t have any issues with horrible stinky farts, he doesn’t have any issues with his tummy or being able to poo.
Diesel apparently finds going to the toilet far easier with his plant-based diet, with Alice noticing how he will experience discomfort when friends give him meat from their plates.
Alice has claimed Diesel is always praised for his vitality during check-ups at the vets. He apparently has good teeth, and is a healthy weight for a dog of his stature.
Alice has said:
When he was a very little puppy I did worry if I was doing the right thing, like you would, but no, he’s just so healthy and has got so much energy that I don’t worry about his diet now.
If his coat had started to deteriorate then I would have questioned what I was feeding him. I know that his diet must be really good if his coat is this good so I don’t worry about it now.
He does love chewing shoes and I wondered if, because my children have a few leather ones, if maybe he’s desperate for meat. But no, he chews the plastic ones just as much. It’s just that he’s a puppy and will chew everything. Apart from the odd shoe, he’s vegan.
However, Alice has received some criticism for the way she feeds Diesel, with some people getting ‘funny’ with her after learning Diesel is a vegan dog.
According to Alice:
People do have a go at me about me. I have had people get funny with me when I say my dog is vegan. They say, ‘what do you mean he’s vegan? You can’t not feed a dog any meat’.
But if you just look at him, you can see how healthy he is. His coat is immaculate, I don’t even brush him that much, and it just glistens in the sun. It shows that he’s eating well.
It’s just the fear of the unknown, I think, because people will do that with me and my dietary choices too.
She continued:
If I did live a couple of hundred years ago in a little village with one farmer and one butcher, and you only had meat on Sundays which was locally sourced, I probably would still be eating meat.
But the way we treat animals now, how we are doing it is just horrendous. Who would want to be a part of that? The damage it is causing is astonishing. Especially with my generation, we have been brought up to disassociate ourselves so much with the process and what it actually is.
When people say they’re kind and they wouldn’t hurt a fly, and dote on their dog but then they feed them a cow or a pig. A pig has got more intelligence than your dog but you’re feeding your dog a pig? It doesn’t make sense.
Why should another animal be killed to feed my dog? It doesn’t seem right. It’s really nice for me to be able to be kind with my diet and be kind with my dog’s diet too.
Alice and Diesel certainly appear to be happy with their vegan lifestyle.
However, pet owners should always make sure to check with their vet before making changes to their animal’s diet.
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Jules studied English Literature with Creative Writing at Lancaster University before earning her masters in International Relations at Leiden University in The Netherlands (Hoi!). She then trained as a journalist through News Associates in Manchester. Jules has previously worked as a mental health blogger, copywriter and freelancer for various publications.