How to manage radiation-induced diarrhea?

Oh yeah I am dealing with this right now. Everything is a challenge and I learned the fiber thing by accident. I eat rice, potatoes,toast,crackers,bagels,ripe bananas,sugar free jello. I have 2 weeks to go .I wish you well.

I have diarrhea at the best of times so things were much worse during chemo and radiation. I did end up following the low fiber, bland diet that the radiation nurse recommended. It was very boring but it worked for me. I posted a copy of this diet in a post last year. See https://csn.cancer.org/node/314626

I had my radiation treatments at 9:15 in the morning. I didn't eat or drink coffee (also a diarrhea catalyst for me) until after I had the radiation treatment. 

zsazsa1 said:

Thanks.  I just took a look

Thanks.  I just took a look at it.  I can do that.  I just hope it helps.  I have only gotten through about ten of a planned 28 treatments so far!  I don't know how I'm gonna make it!  The worst is that I have to have a full bladder and an empty rectum for treatment - which is very hard to achieve, when I'm having such bad cramping from diarrhea.  I'm thinking that maybe I just won't eat until after radiation treatment each day.

Zsa Zsa,oh,how I feel for you!I just finished my chemo-radiation,which lasted for 5 weeks,5 days a week,weekends off. I had a similar dilemma to yours,but a bit more complicated:my chemo consisted of pills of Xeloda,which I needed to take at home twice a day,12 hours apart. I had chosen 9AM and 9PM. I HAD to eat 30 minuts prior to swallowing the pills. My radiation had been scheduled every day around noon. I had daily diarrhea,thankfully not watery till the last week.

But there was still a problem:I would had loved NOT to eat before going to the hospital for radiation,which way I could had prevented bouts of diarrhea...but I must had some food for Xeloda. 

When I was done with the pills,I had to make sure to have my bladder full...plus I had been taking public transportation to the hospital;now: being worried about having diarrhea and holding my bladder full,and being on time for my appointment it has been stressful as hell!

I managed by some miracle all of those 25 days without having an embarrasing accident.... Yesterday was my first day of freedom from it!!!

It is only first part of my cancer journey;there are some tests and many appointments waiting for me,and later a colon tumor surgery.Who knows,what will happened after that?

Zsa Zsa,I wish you to get through this difficult stage and every other treatments that are waiting for you!

Suzy

I never had diarea with radiation. Idolized the diet too closely and had constipation which:I had a little of before and continue to have.

zsazsa1 said:

Had a discussion with the

Had a discussion with the radiation oncologist yesterday.  He said that the treatment I've had thus far (about 12 of the planned 28 treatments) will have been for naught unless I complete it - that there is no efficacy unless I get to ever 4000 (plan is 4500 to nodes, 5000 to vagina).  I don't know what to do.  He said it's unusual to see diarrhea this badly this early, and he couldn't say if it didn't forbode long term diarrhea.  I'm going to add in the probiotic.  I'm already basically eating only rice, white bread, meat.

zsazsa1 I too had horrible diarrhea throughout my radiation treatments. Pretty much right from the start. I was told to eat "white" which I did but worried about nutrition. I took lomotil several times a day, a probiotic, and ate a peanut butter sandwich on white bread for lunch. I used a water bottle to clean myself. I was teaching and I saved most of my eating for evenings so I wouldn't embarass myself at work. I completed all of my treatments but the diarrhea persisted for months afterward. I went to a homeopathic pharmacist and he changed my probiotic and recommended B12 and B6 in addition to a multivitamin. Voila! almost overnight I improved. I was excited to eat salads again! I sure hope you can get some relief.

zsazsa1 said:

So I did a little reading

So I did a little reading about probiotics, and in mice it was found that starting the probiotic BEFORE radiation tx seemed to help prevent the damage.  I'm gonna try the Culturelle now, but I wish I had known this!  Also, Jan, what probiotic did the naturopath switch you to?

you didn’t find the Culturelle info on here because it was pretty widespread when I was going into radiation. And I swear, I had no diarrhea.