Let's Talk Poop

ac said:

Juicing during chemo
Paulette,

I was diagnosed with stage 3 sigmoidal colon cancer in last year. The doctors treated this as a rectal cancer and I had 5 1/2 weeks of neo adjuvant radiation and chemotherapy, surgery followed by another 18 weeks of chemotherapy.

During my entire treatment, I juiced everyday. I tried asking the oncologist and dietician at the hospital about juicing and the general consensus was it is fine as long as I did not take high doses of vitamin C (from tablets or intravenously). Juicing was fine from this angle. But do check with your doctors especially if you are radically changing your diet. I think they would generally be more concerned with you maintaining weight so be sure to keep a healthy balance between "eating anything" as my doctors suggested and maintaining weight.

I used a blender as opposed to a juicer for two reasons:-

1. The blender does not filter the fiber out of the juice. You will need to add water or natural juices as a base since there wouldn't be sufficient liquid otherwise.

2. It was easier on the wallet especially if you are thinking of getting a premium juicer.

I try to mix it up with my selections, eg. blackberry/acai juice, carrots, strwaberries, banana, brocolli. The general rule of thumb was to have as many different colored fruits and vegetables per serving to ensure that I had a good variety of different vitamins and nutrients.

I think juicing was really helpful for me since I had rather mild chemotherapy side effects until the last couple of cycles. Unfortunately, I haven't been as diligent in maintaining this regime since I stopped working from home.

I hope this helps. Good luck!

Andrew

2bhealed said:

My Diet in a Nutshell
Hi Wa,

Welcome. I see you're new to the boards.

My diet has changed over the years. There's my pre-cancer diet, my heal-my-cancer diet, my maintain my cancer-free status diet, my loosened-up diet, and my Triathlon Training Diet.

Let's start with my heal-my-cancer diet. I did this diet for 6 months--the same time frame as if I had been doing the chemo (which I didn't do). This diet was macrobiotic, vegan and purely simple:

fresh organic veggie juices with flax seeds, protein powder, and a "green" powder
fruit smoothies
brown rice
brown rice sushi (nori rolls)
steamed veggies
ezekial bread
tofu


After I got my first 6 month cancer free report I added things like wild salmon occasionally and enjoyed free range organic turkey on Thanksgiving--that kind of thing. Plus I added some "treats". (which for me still don't consist of any kind of refined white/brown sugar--ever).

So here's a sample of what I eat:

Sunday Breakfast (had them today)

vegan whole grain waffles
butter
strawberries
agave syrup

Lunch

ww pita bread
veganaise (like mayo)
sliced cukes
sliced tomato
avocado
sprouts
hemp nuts (for protein)

Bearitos Tortilla chips


Supper

piece of fish
steamed broc
lg salad with walnuts, scallions, carrots, cukes and Annie's dressing

Snack or meal at some point I have my 16 oz of veggie juice pretty much every single day.

Breakfast

Blueberry/banana smoothie
NOW vegan protein powder
flax oil


Lunch

black beans in ww tortilla
spinach
tomatoes
sprouts
Pace picante or Bragg's Amino Acids


Supper

Turkey patty
lg salad with the works
Annie's dressing with some flax oil squirted on
sweet potatoe

dessert
ww chocolate chip cookies made with barley malt/stevia or honey. The choco chips are grain-sweetened dark choc from my coop. This is a true treat.

If I haven't had a smoothie for breakfast I sometimes will have one as my dessert and with the frozen banana it's just like ice cream for me.

Breakfast

muesli soaked in almond milk
banana

Lunch

egg salad sandwich in a ww pita
cukes & tomato
sprouts

Bearitos chips


Supper

ratatouille on millet (totally YUM!)-- zucchini, onions and tomatoes cooked with garlic, simmered so it makes a nice broth to put on the millet.


ok, I gotta go make supper now. i am totally hungry!

Does this help? I tried to give you a glimpse into my diet.

It's not perfect. But I try. My husband laughs when I say I'm "cheating" cuz my cheat would still be considered health food to most. In the summer I may get some nitrate-free natural brats for the grill, or make my garbanzo bean pasta salad, and indulge in some potato chips. Yes, shocker. We all have some weakness be it a coffee addiction or ya gotta have a beer (I don't do either) but at picnics, I have been known to have some chips. I go in spurts of AAAACK! I can't eat that....to.....ok, I'm gonna have a few. But, you have to know, I didn't indulge at picnics until I had about 6 YEARS of cancer-free reports under my belt and know how to counteract them with balancing my pH.

I tell you this in honesty so you don't think I am making anything up. I really do eat this way. I'm not cleaning it up for the public. :-)

peace, emily the juice chip (I mean chick)