Easy foods for chemo

Dear Cattlemom, I live in a rural area too and actually grow many of my own vegetables. I forced myself to eat during chemo so I wouldn't scare my kids with too much weight loss. Everything tasted like cardboard, but I ate anyway. One thing I did actually like was grits! I'm a former southern girl and plain grits with a tiny knob of butter really helped my nausea. Please remember this is all temporary. When you stop the chemo, your hunger and sense of taste will come right back. Take care, Anna

The only thing I wanted to eat was pasta with butter and garlic.

Although not much tasted good, I gained quite a bit of weight.

I used plastic utensils and paper plates.

Good luck.

JoAnn

I wasn't nauseated, but  agree with a previous comment, most of my food tasted like wet cardboard, no flavor, and had to just make myself eat. My absolute favorite food was watermelon, I could go through a watermelon all by myself in 2 days. Good thing it was summer and they were available. I also happened to find that lemon was the one flavor I could still taste so I had lemon flavored pudding cups, lemonade, lemon suckers, etc. I was tired of drinking water that I started added a slice of lemon to my water bottle and that helped.

I also liked mashed potatoes, even the instant ones. The only way I could drink the whey protein shakes and cover up that terrible aftertaste was to add some vanilla ice cream, a hand immersion blender was great for those.

cattlemom01 said:

Thanks everyone for your

Thanks everyone for your comments.  I think I will try the fruit pops and the corn syrup ones do not work.  They did the first chemo but after the second one they also taste like baking soda. I did find today after I posted that Lipton Soup packeages that you add to boiling water are not too bad so we will keep with those for a while as well as Ginger Ale I just got a small bottle at the convenience store.  I will get through this just very frustrating.  I hope by summer I can taste all the good things like corn on the cob and steak on the grill.  I absolutely love grilled food when I am healthy.

 

Hi.  I think we are all different in what tastes okay during chemo.  I also found it very frustrating that I couldn't stand a lot of my favorite foods.  I was lucky that within a few weeks of ending treatment my taste buds returned to normal.  There are still a few things I don't eat because they tasted so awful during that time.  I also found lemony things quite good.  Best of luck to you and by no way should you feel like a downer.  This group was so helpful to me.  I would ask what I thought was a stupid question only to find that many others had the same one.

morgamed said:

No chemo for me but lost taste after surgery

I'm a coffee holic.  Morning noon and night but lost all taste right after a bilateral surgey.  Everything tasted like tar..yes road tar.  Three weeks of me eating lemons with salt on them my husband had had enough.  So we went on a food crawl.  4 resturants a night and ordered four or five things and tasted everything on each plate until something suited me.  Well after almost two weeks of this I started getting my taste buds back.  However I was having way to much fun with this food crawl thing never did tell hubby when I got my taste buds back.. to this day he still likes doing the food crawl thing. 

Give it a few weeks but in the mean time taste foods till you find something you think you recognize or like.  Who said fried pickles with mustard and soy sauce didn't taste good?

Eat, Drink...it is only temporary...

I could only tolerate soft foods while on chemo. I know this was probably the worst thing for my body but when I couldn't even look at food I found that I could eat a plain Arbys Roast Beef sandwich and keep it down. I also developed a craving for ice cream( plain vanilla )the coolness of the food  was soothing.Do you have a blender or a nutri bullet? Perhaps a homemade protein shake with fruit and yogurt would help and give you the norishment you need . I  also found that chemo made me really sensitive to scent. If the smell of food makes you sick keep a lemon nearby, I used to hold the lemon up to my nose when I smelt anything offensive and having two boys (one a teenager at the time) playing baseball and football the lemon was a godsend. I hope that you will find what works for you and remember you will get through chemo and when you do I will be holding the light at the end of the tunnel. Love Surf

tasha_111 said:

Food....

Hi there.  I found food nearly impossible when I was doing chemo.  I was lucky as I could drink milk, I got through 4-6 pints a day (twice that amount of beer too)  Any food was either tasteless and a horrible texture, or tasted like poison and a horrible texture.  I found baked tates with butter was tolerable.  Also, couldn't eat with metal , had to use plastic knives and forks, or just hands.   I too loved coffee before chemo, now 5 years later, cannot even stand the smell of it, a lot of your taste bud changes will stay for a long time.     Good luck hun, it is a trial.  

 

 

Luckily my taste and appetite was pretty much ok until rounds 3 and 4.  The first two I just didn't find food very interesting, but nothing tasted bad.  Then it hit me hard.  I found ice cream, milk shakes, and smothies (with yogurt) to be most helpful.   Ever so often I'd get a hankering for something and my husband would provide it only to have me be unable to eat it.  It was actually pretty awful as I recall, but I forced myself to eat for nutrition and calories.  Small amounts, often.  Good luck.  It is temporary.

Suzanne