Fustrated

I am sooo fustrated and worried...    I haven't been able to get all my protein in although I saw a post on here that provided some information I am going to try, about unflavored proteins.  I had bought some proteins powder that I found I liked and now I can't stomach the darn thing...   I've lost some hair, but not to worried seeing how I had waaaay to much hair to begin with. I actually feel its more manageable now....

Back to the topic..  I haven't been able to get all my protein in and I'm having trouble with adding foods back in...   I've had to take a step or two back and take it a whole lot slower...  broths, soups and such settle perfectly, so long as there is no cream/milk product or large pieces of chicken or vegetable in them.  I can eat mashed potatoes and sweet potatoes, apple sauce, but I use to be able to eat eggs and now I can't stomach them.  Last time I tried I ended up in the bathroom vomiting...  when I tried chicken I ended up vomiting..  however ground chicken and ground turkey settled fine... *Sigh*....  I feel like every new food I try I bring it back up...   the only thing that I have been able to steadly tolerate has been cream of wheat... I never liked it before surgery, now its the stable of my daily diet....  when all else fails an ounce of that will do it for me...  Has anyone else had problems with keeping foods in as they added them in?  I mean I can eat chicken, but if its ground up only or a turkey hotdog (not even half of one).  But eat a piece of roasted chicken (1oz) that's not going down at all.... 

So when I have an episode where I've brought my food up again, I usually bring out the cream of wheat box and do that later in the day...  dont' get my wrong I love cream of wheat but I can't live on that forever and feel like I'm doing something wrong.  

On the flip side, also having trouble with my employers contracted company that handles my FMLA claim... they approved my leave until next week, however they denied my salary continuation claim.. I think I almost lost it.. I had eaten two bites of potato which promptly came back up when I went nuts about the news...  so I'm dealing with appealing the denial since I need to get paid or I'll fall behind on my bills and what not...  but does feelings affect your eating as well?? Just curious?!

 

Thankfully I do have an appoitnment with Dr. Barba this thursday at which time I will speak with him about the constant vomiting up foods, almost always when I introduce a new one and sometimes old ones, like eggs, that I had no problem with and now can't eat although I still like them.

Most people have trouble with chicken right after surgery and you're still a newbie.   I totally could not eat eggs right after either but now i eat them all the time. Meat in general is dry, especially chicken.   My favorite thing was nice tender pot roast with gravy.  Some people are afraid of the gravy due to the fat but I found adding the moisture really helped alot. Soups with meat work well too.  You may want to take a trip to Boston Market for their chicken noodle soup or Wendy's for the chili.  I ate alot of Wendy's chili in the beginning. Until you can really keep down enough food, you might want to try adding some Carnation Instant Breakfast.  I really liked the chocolate ready made one. Hope you're feeling better soon.....

Thanks for the info and reassurance. I've thought about buying the carnation instant breakfast but wasn't sure if that was okay.  I do like soups and they go down very well. My concern with pot roast and chili is beef. I was told to stay away from beef until Dr. Barba clears me for that due to the composition (forget the exact term) ... its not easy for our small stomachs to digest.     I have plenty of chicken noodle and actually tried a little bit of hte lipton and it went down perfectly. I cracked and egg and beat into the broth at the end of heating to add a little more nutrition value.   Eggs were fine before and now they are not... :(  that gets me, but my consolation is that cream of wheat settles perfectly, has some iron and protein and I haven't gotten tired of it yet. I did try chicken again, just a bit of chicken wing i made for the family, took a small bit for myself for dinner and sure enough in the bathroom all over again today, dumping my stomach contents.... *sigh*  I think I'll stick with the soups for now... they seem a safe bet and I do like soups.   I also plan to talk to Dr. Barba about this to make sure there is nothing I should be concerned about. 

Just a thought about the chicken wing:  wings are very fatty.  You may want to try canned white meat chicken.  It is extremely moist and has worked very well for me. I'm only 3 weeks post op and have found the canned chicken a blessing!

I am going to offer some insight, but please do not take it as a slam.  First off, there are a few products you can get that have no flavor and can be added to your liquids to help with the protein.  Unjury is one.  You can google it and find sales to purchase it.  There is also Profect, which is a protein drink that is only 2.9oz and you can choose from 25g or 42g.  The fruit punch is the only good one and tastes like melted jello and at only 2.9oz you can tolerate like medicine if so needed.   Now on to your food consumption.  You really need to reassess your intake.  You are not getting ANY nutritional benefit from anything you say you eat (not the kind you need to be healthy and stay healthy), plus you are eating a lot of carbs.  In order to keep up the success of the "tool"  you need to change the behaviors now while your tool is new.  Most of us are carb addicts and eating through it will not help.  The suggestion of Wendy's Chili is a good one, but not too often because it does have lots of carbs.  Trying to stay below 20g of carbs a day should be your goal.  I am only telling you this because being out a long time and religiously going to my support meetings, ALL of the people who struggle with regain are the ones who incorporate more and more carbs in their eating patterns.  I am no exception, and if I can help one person not have that happen, I'll keep trying.

I had issues early out with eggs myself.  I love eggs and it ticked me off not being able to eat them.  Try again in a few months.  It took me about 6 months before I could eat them again.  Now solid meats were difficult, but I would steam a ton of spinach and chop it up fine and mix my also finely chopped meat with the spinach.  (hint, this really helps with the bowel problems too). I wish you great success and please just know I wrote this to help you, not be mean Tee

Hi, Even though your cream of wheat is your comfort food right now, it's not a real good thing to be eating, because it's al carbs and you're supposed to be getting in mostly protein at this stage out.  Stay away from the potatoes, pasta, etc.  It's way too early to be eating these foods. Can you eat cottage cheese?  That is a good thing w/ a few reduced fat wheat thins or whole wheat crackers.  If you're lactose intolerant, get lactaid pills and take right before you take your first bite.  It works well for me. I couldn't do eggs in the beginning, either.  I'm two years out and I can't have fried eggs or I get diarrahea...I can only have scrambled eggs w/ american cheese melted into them now.  And that's not too often. If you are going to eat carbs, make sure they are a good comples carb like whole grains and such.  Stay away from the refined white sugar things.  Don't worry about getting in your veggies right now.  First and foremost right now is your protein.  Don't get all hyper over all the food groups.  Protein is the key and work with those foods. Meat....you HAVE to cut it up to pieces equal to the size of a pencil eraser and chew, chew, chew it until it's pulvorized...add gravies and low fat salad dressings to moisten things up. I can not eat dry chicken...it has to have been boiled in a salty brine water first then coated with bbq sauce or dressing.  Pork is not my friend since surgery, either.  TOo dry and just doesn't sit well.  YUK...tastes yucky to me, too. I think you're vomitting because you're taking in too big of pieces, not chewing it well enough and it ends up getting stuck and then you have to vomit it up.  A lot of people have these problems, you are not alone. Chew, chew, chew..little pieces...tiny, tiny, tiny pieces...you have a tiny pouch and opening now...it's all about baby sizes! Talk to him about your carb intake.  Carnation instant breakfast is a good thing, w/ milk, it's a decent amount of protein. You should be only introducing new foods when you know the food you just tried has worked for you for a few tries.  Don't over do it.  You'll just stress out yourself and your body. Also make sure you're not drinking w/ your meals and get your water/fluids in. Bring in list to Dr Barba with all of your questions and concerns. Good luck paula

I'll definitly bring all this up with him. The cream of wheat, oatmeal and eggs, are the first foods he had me try to eat, which is why I eat them now since they settle well. I would honestly rather eat meats and fish since they are higher in protein.   Tuna settles perfectly with a little lite mayo and dash of salt.   I don't really eat potatoes that often, since surgery I've probably had them 2-3 times...  I keep trying everything that he has on his list for me, just half of the stuff isn't settlign, but you could be right about the bites... since most of what doesn't settle well are meats. I'll have to make sure next time I try that I eat cut them as small as I can possible get them... and see how that works.   I will ask Dr. barba about everything, including suggestions on other high protein, low carb foods that he might recommend I eat to replace the Cream of wheat and such foods... and T I really appreciate your input cause I wasn't seeing the Cream of wheat as carbs, just as the food that settled best when I ate it... but you are correct, I need to refrain from eating carns, refrain or seriously limit the intake, so THANKS for making me see what I was doing.

 Going to go to the UNJURY site to order a few samples to make sure that I can still tolerate the stuff, if I do I'm switching to them for my protein supplement!

 

Can you tolerate shrimp?  ****tail Shrimp were my main staple food when first out.  I pureed it in soft stage then ate little bits of ****tail shrimp w ****tail sauce and loved (still do) them. *Cheese sticks *Cottage cheese *ricotta cheese *soy protein like tofu *refried beans *beef done in sauces (both DH and I  had RNY and we tolerate beef the best and have from beginning as long as it's cut up in eraser sized pieces and chewed slowly and well) *greek yogurt (thicker than normal yogurt and a lot of protei in it) Remember, that you can put unflavored protein powder into foods to give them a protein boost.  We used/use unflavored Unjury added to lots of foods to give them a boost.  It does have a hint of changed flavor, but it's worth it. Paula

NO! No shrimp!  I'm highly allergic to shellfish.   I did try tofu and my stomach couldn't handle it.  But I think I will try some of your other suggestions... greek yogurt... never heard of it but will try to see if I find it at my local grocery store.  I do like cheese sticks, cottage cheese and ricotta cheese. Refried beans, umm... never thought of that one.. hmmm... As for the unlfavored protein, I did order some from UNJURY to see how I do with it. Hoping it works better than the ISOPURE and NECTAR that I have now which is driving me nutz having to drink it.

The greek yogurt that I buy is by Stonyfield and is called Oikos.  There is plain that you can flavor w/ vanilla and sweetener or they have a vanilla.  It comes in a short squatty single serving tub.  It's expensive, but, to me, well worth it cause one tub has 15gms of protein. It's thick like a whipped cottage cheese consistency...Hubby and I love it and have Price Chopper order more for us cause they can't keep the stuff on the shelf! Go to Stonyfield yogurt (google it) website and print out a coupon. Paula