I haven’t been able to bite or chew since 2014 as a result of my third head and neck cancer surgery.
That surgery gave me trismus, limited mouth opening, and a severed nerve – the one that works my left lower lip. I dribble out of it no matter how hard I try not to.
But from 2014 to 2021, even after radiotherapy, I could eat mashed food. My dinner was often some soft meat and veg with bought gravy and I would quite enjoy it. I could eat cake with custard. Gradually I lost most of my remaining teeth and things slowly became more difficult.
2021 and I had a big surgery with a thigh flap added to my throat – after a few weeks I could swallow again but my taste had changed and the former food either didn’t taste as good or the texture was off and that only got worse as I went through two more small surgeries (one earlier this year) with skin grafts.
I was meant to be able to eat “minced and moist” but I couldn’t – not without functioning teeth, no with all the damage to my mouth.
Now in 2024 I am still experimenting to see what I can eat. I’ve tried mashed potatoes many a time but they feel absolutely awful in my mouth – I can get them down but they feel grainy and truly horrible. Some meat dishes are okay if blended to just a few lumps – pork, chicken, some lamb. Beef is almost tolerable. They have to be at soup or casserole consistency and blended with a hand blender. I have to add lite sour cream to mitigate any excessive spiciness because my mouth stings in parts.
The above is mainly to do with my altered taste. Savoury things taste more intense and if things taste awful I just can’t do it.
Oh, I can eat breakfast foods like porridge and weetbix and even add fruit like heated tinned peaches and apricots. The heat makes them easier to mash.
I had three children and must have cooked throughout those years (I’ve forgotten) but my kids often remind me how bad I was at it. Now I seriously dislike cooking for myself – over and over again I’ve made a recipe for four to divide into containers for the freezer but the food I make tastes so bad that I throw it away in despair.
I think I’ve been in denial since my last surgery and that I have very impaired taste and food processing ability. The implants which have straightened my mouth to everyone’s delight have not stopped me dribbling because the nerve is still dead and the depth below my lip is shallow because of the skin graft. I’m dribbling worse than ever, have to have a small cloth in my hands at all times and can’t keep food and drink in my mouth without some leaking out.
If I was one of those exemplary and determined people you often read about in cancer stories I would practise in front of the mirror until I got it right. Why don’t I blimmin’ do that? Maybe, I will one day.
I still have lots of tins of Ensure left over from my last surgery but if I drink the recommended amount I put on weight. At nearly 80 kg with an arthritic knee and a love of walking that is not a good thing for me. Reducing it to about 3 scoops a day has sent my weight down to less than 80. I use Heatheries chocolate low carb protein powder in my smoothies and feel very rueful that it has doubled in price at Countdown lately.
I add any fruit I have to my smoothies and a couple of nuts, maybe ground sunflower seeds but I don’t like the taste of the latter. I add a few frozen cherries if available to thicken up the shake. Berries are gritty because of the seeds and I can’t abide the taste of banana any more.
I can eat soup but need to blend it so that there are only tiny lumps left. I haven’t enjoyed it much because of my altered taste for anything savoury but lately I have tolerated chicken and vege soup, cauliflower and cheese soup and have forced down beef and lentil soup. These soups cost $5 or $6 and can last me for two meals. Sometimes I cook vegetables, puree them and add to the soups. I rarely make soups for myself because of the aforementioned poor cooking skills. Going back to potatoes though, I now remember than I can make a leek and potato soup as long as it is mainly leeks.
I am a hard worker and like to be productive. I like learning. Why I can’t learn to cook for myself? I think it’s because I’m on a negative feedback loop. I try to cook and have a bad result a couple of times (I’m a hard person to cook for) and that gives me an attitude of helplessness so I buy readymade food that I know is less likely to be wasted. I’ve got nerve damge to my feet from chemo which means standing in one spot for an extended period is uncomfortable (weak excuse that one).
I eat a lot of ice cream which is the only food my mind lets me enjoy. I somehow need to talk myself out of this and persuade my mind to make me enjoy my soups. I can make an egg custard to put on it – a sort of cooking laziness stops me from doing this often enough.
So how is my health with all this? It’s pretty good. I was a bit high on glucose and low on iron in my 2nd to last blood test but the most recent test raised no cause for alarm. I’m strong for my age and do a lot of walking in spite of bad arthritis in one knee. I am always on the alert for dietary deficiencies though, trying to calculate whether I have had enough protein, iron, vitamins. I’m cutting it fine!
I know I can do better and have read heaps about how to motivate myself – how to train myself to develop better eating habits.
Maybe I’ll try goal setting … yeah, my goal is to make two meals off my own bat in the next week …