what to eat during chemo

I gravitated to beans.
They seemed to have kept their flavor more than anything else. I particularly like pinto beans.

But you know, everyone's palate is different. I found for me, anything that was spicy tasted more distorted than a more bland food.

Hope this helps a bit.

You're so precious in helping your Grandma. I pray she goes through her treatments without much difficulty.


Hugs,

Sylvia

Snowkitty said:

I lived on nuked baby red
I lived on nuked baby red potatoes with butter and salt. Get her Ensure. The butter pecan is great. Protein is important, like chicken breast (which I don't normally like, but tasted great while on chemo). Yogurt felt good on my mouth. Couldn't tolerate anything spicy.

I'm a choco-haulic, but it didn't even have a taste to me.

Take care, Cindy

Its interesting how your
Its interesting how your body reacts. I normally have a sweet tooth and I couldnt tolerate anything sweet. now sweet tooth is back. She will have to tell you what appeals to her. In addition, depending on her symptoms she may want to add certain foods, if constipated, adding fiber, if diahrea avoiding certain triggers etc...
Remember mouth care, biotene, chewing ice during chemo to avoid mouth sores. and hydrate hydrate hydrate.
So glad she has you to help, hope it goes well

carkris said:

Its interesting how your
Its interesting how your body reacts. I normally have a sweet tooth and I couldnt tolerate anything sweet. now sweet tooth is back. She will have to tell you what appeals to her. In addition, depending on her symptoms she may want to add certain foods, if constipated, adding fiber, if diahrea avoiding certain triggers etc...
Remember mouth care, biotene, chewing ice during chemo to avoid mouth sores. and hydrate hydrate hydrate.
So glad she has you to help, hope it goes well

My oncologist'a approach
whatever patient like. I personally did made serious diet changes (like in Anticancer book) and follow them through the Chemo. But after 3 cycles everything tasted metal, I have not had any pleasure at all, just forced myself to eat to maintaining my weight. Since I started from 114 pounds it was a serious concern. Hydration is very critical. I have not eaten sugar in 2 two years
Good Luck

We're all so different!
I lost all sense of taste and appetite. I lost 40 lbs because i just didn't want to eat and hated trying to force food down - never had any nausea.

'Habit' held out good for me on keeping enough water going in as I always have a glass of ice water or a cup of herb tea with me no matter what I'm doing - so the 'habit' ("adiction" LOL) kept me drinking.

Absolutely nothing had any flavor to it - not even the hot horseraddish or hot European mustard that I love. I never eat anything that is hot with pepper so don't know if it would have 'tasted' or not. The lack of taste lasted til long after I had finished rads but taste had started back about 1/2 way through them. I never had any metalic taste - had absolutely no taste at all. Basically my diet has always been very balanced so I just kept eating (what little I ate) the same. I drank a fair bit of V8 and ate bananas, FL oranges and WA apples. The texture of frozen Jello was good. Even with hubby calling me several times a day (and him fixing good meals) to remind me to eat, I still lost 40 lbs during chemo and another 5 during rads.

We're all different - just keep an eye on her and listen - even to what she doesn't say verbally.

Susan

lafera12 said:

what to eat
I found that nothing would taste good. But I did try to eat whatever I could, but
still lost weight.
I did get the drinks that they sell ie: Ensure, Boost,etc. They helped me get the
vitamins I was missing. Maybe they would help your grandmother.
Angie

I agree with your grandma!
Heavy metal!!! So maybe my suggestions will help. Little pieces of banana, apples, hard boiled eggs, and ginger ale.

TraciInLA said:

Metallic taste
I had that horrible metallic taste off and on throughout chemo, and the worst part was how disgusting plain water tasted, so I found I wasn't drinking as much water as I knew I should.

Crystal Light to the rescue! I don't like the taste of Crystal Light made full-strength, but just a sprinkle in my water glass really, really helped with the metallic taste. And they have like 1000 flavors -- it was kind of fun trying a different flavor each week when I went to the grocery store.

Others on this board have found that adding lemon slices to water helps cut the metallic tasts, and many suggest buying plastic utensils, as silverware can just make it worse.

Hope that helps,

Traci

Salty
I have a salty metallic taste in my mouth. Everything is salty. Yuck! I suck on sugar free hard candies to help get rid of the salty taste.

Kimosabe said:

Have her eat whatever
Have her eat whatever appeals to her. I found I craved certain foods and the thought of others made me nauseous so I just went with my cravings - at least I was eating, which is important to keep up your strength. Good luck.

Eating
I ate a lot of chicken noodle soup, cheese sandwiches, and Ensure shakes with yogurt ice cream. I found that food started tasing much better after a few weeks of the chemo and I began to have a much more balanced diet. My onc wouldn't let me eat any fruit that couldn't be peeled and any raw vegetables. I felt as though I were in Mexico for 18 weeks. Unfortunately I have to go back on chemo next week, but a different kind this time. We'll see how Gemzar affects the taste buds.

abbimom said:

thank you
thank you for all your suggestions and well wishes. I really appreciate it. I actually had tongue cancer 10 years ago and understand the taste of metal. One thing that never lost the taste to me was clam chowder, how weird is that. Thank you and I'm making sure she drinks her ensure, just like me she prefers the vanilla
thanks and best wishes,
Linda

I ate lots of chicken soup,
I ate lots of chicken soup, and craved protein like pork chops. and ate fish. I THINK MY BODY WAS TELLING ME 'FEED ME"

cahjah75 said:

The only thing
that changed for me was plain water. I add True Lemon or Crystal Lite. I use plastic silverware and had no change in food. Nothing tasted like metal. I guess I'm one of the lucky ones. I also use Biotene toothpaste and mouthwash.
Char

Bottled water tastes much
Bottled water tastes much better than tap. The best thing I have found to add to water is the propel water, gatorade, and G2 powder packets. The kiwi propel has a very mild taste to it, plus adds some vitamins into it.

I have a metal taste, but also everything tastes spicy, ketchup is like blazing sauce LOL. Anything mild and comforting, you'll just have to experiment. I sometimes just want a plain cheese sandwich, not grilled, just bread and cheese and maybe some butter. My beloved Diet Coke tastes horrible, but the occasional beer tastes good, go figure LOL. (yes just on occasion) When milk in my cereal started tasting weird, I tried my son's almond milk, and it is fabulous.

Rague said:

Horrible tap water
Our town water is HORRIBLE! We don't drink it or use it to cook or give to the dogs or my bunny, so I buy a lot of water out of the Culligan machine at WalMart. It consistantly fails tests and gets extentions to try to improve it. It's clear of disease/bacteria organisms but the other stuff is not nice. I don't remember exctly what (reminder to self - go to town hall and get a copy of the latest tests) but I seem to remember that some form of radiation is above the allowed level. One of the town's wells is a hot well - hot as in the water comes up hot to touch even in the deepest of winter. The water in Rapid isn't that bad, can just taste the chlorine, but they get their water out of Rapid Creek, not wells.

Metal taste
Metal taste may not be the food but the utensils she is using. I had to use plastic ware when I had treatment.

Margo