Tastebuds

Thank you for your replies to my Gemcitabine query very helpful.

My next query is less worrying but very annoying since I started treatment last year I have had a definite change to my sense of smell and taste and being a real ‘foody’ I found this to be one of the more frustrating sides of this whole journey.

Chocolate smells horrible and tastes odd, bacon makes me feel sick and everything else is just weird the only and I mean only food item that I can eat with any pleasure is an iced doughnut ? Plus due to my Stoma (due to the cancer attacking my bowel) some foods I can’t eat due to blockage risks and I’ve had about a dozen!

How do you cope and any tips on things to eat?

Thanks

Hungry Jan 😋 xxx

[Nancy222]

Hi Scotty,

That metalic taste is so awful, isn't it? Just recently I've started plugging my nose while eating. My appetite is off and it's important that I eat, so it has to be done.

Everything has a weird smell, including my refrigerator. The produce section of the market is enough to send me scurrying out.

One of the chemo nurses told me that she has a patient who, while eating, peels an orange so the citrus oil overrides everything.

I eat small amounts and my foods are warm, not hot, and I take my time. I keep away from garlic (sob) and strong flavours. Oddly, I can eat fish and chips so I do

I'll watch this thread with interest.

Take care of yourself.

XXOO

[coksd]

Hi Scotty22 I rem when on Carbo/taxo esp the last 2 sessions my taste was awful bad and its funny you mentioned the doughnuts, I could only find coffee slices or eclairs from the bakery nice to eat also there was a chipper with really nice curry sauce I drove an hour one day to get it but it was so nice, I also found dry roasted peanuts nice and lucozade original its all really bad food but it worked through a bad few days. Hope you feel better soon. xxx Clare

[January-2016-UK]

I found chocolate tasted odd and red wine also. Sometimes I think the milk has gone off in tea / coffee but other times it seems fine. I’ve found that smaller portions but a greater variety of foods helps as a forkful of something that doesn’t seem appetising can taste better after a couple of forkfuls of something else. Having said that, I do remember there were days during first line when I just didnt really fancy anything. I found it important not to leave a meal too late or miss one in case I became ravenous and ate too quickly. This my third chemo and each time I’ve eaten biscuits. I used to leave them on the edge of my plate when given them with a coffee. Rich tea, cream crackers, gingers I’ve eaten them all now! A couple of days ago I bouught a bottle of ginger wine. I usually only have that if it’s Christmas, Rabbie Burns or there’s snow on the ground. I can drink it though. Ginger’s got to be good for me as well even if the drink isn’t up there with the wine buffs. I sometimes think strong tastes are better but sometimes find that bland is better. I don’t have a stoma nor have I suffered blockages so taste must come into it somehow.

Smell is s bit off and is related to taste. Yesterday on the train a woman sat next to me who seemed to be drenched in an overpowering perfume. I felt a little ill for more than an hour. She got off and I felt fine. At the moment I cannot walk our dog along a little lane we have close by because the fields on either side have been manured. Not bothered me before day after maybe ten mins or so to become acclimatised.

I’d say try to eat healthily and to remember what works one day may not the next. Don’t beat yourself up if you do find some unhealthy options very appealing. For this will pass

[Colman]

Hi. I found the loss of taste absolutely soul destroying. I know we're you are coming from. The only food that I could taste was ice cream but it made my colostomy bag work over time. Good if you are constapated. Beetroot tomatoes and cornbeef all tasted great to me.

Claire x

[AlaNtO]

The taxol group of drugs often produces side effects such as mouth sores, loss of taste, smells sense going upside down irrespective of the Cancer you have. Radiation therapy can do the same. We get Ginger Ale here in South Africa and that tasted great but so sweet! Savoury foods start to have more appeal. The days of chocolates and confectionaries seem to have gone. No doubt these senses will come back - but they never say when.

[Lindaura]

Everybody has their tastebuds impacted differently.

I spent the 7 months of my first illness and Chemo, wracking my brain for foods to eat.

After finding edible foods, they would lose their tastyness after a week and I’d have to search again. Here are some ideas;

Cheese and tomato sandwiches. Finding bread that tastes and feels good is difficult. I went from totally white, to whole grain, then chose sour dough bread.

French fries, oven fries. The skinny ones.

Cheerios.

Cream cheese on toast.

Peanut butter or almond butter on toast.

Pad Thai.

Ramen noodles.

This was a big fall back for me.

Ramen.

No fruit, no chocolate, no tea or coffee. The only juice I could tolerate was Peach or pear nectar and Diet Dr Pepper.

I lost a lot of weight!!!

But put it all back on when I finished treatment, so I look very healthy and eat like a gormand.

Good luck!

Laura