food for thought: top 4 foods i craved on chemotherapy

highlights:

• easy foods to eat while going through chemotherapy
• what to expect with appetite during chemotherapy
• my favorite comfort foods while nauseous

So as most of you may know, chemotherapy is this nasty medicine that makes cancer patients better but causes a long list of revolting side effects.  One of the harshest side effects would be nausea.  This nausea caused me to have a lack of appetite in the hospital to a point where even water sounded distasteful to me.  I would go days on end not eating one bite of food--sometimes I went five days without food.  I lost a lot of weight in response to this poor diet.  After my chemo treatment, I had to eat something while recovering at home.  It's hard to explain, but I was obviously still "hungry" in a sense since my body needed food, but I wasn't hungry (sorry that was confusing).  But here are some of the few foods I would actually kind of crave while working back up my appetite after my long, involuntary fasts.

1. Pho soup

Once I came home from treatments, this was the only thing I demanded.  Pho soup was extremely easy on my stomach and actually tasted good to me.  It was hot and the tastes were not overbearingly strong.  The broth is delicious and definitely fulfilled my need for food and hardy nutrients in my body.  My go-to restaurant for Pho soup was and still is Pho 99 Noodle and Grill in Lake Forest.

2. chips and salsa

Chips and salsa have always been my favorite, but my love was only heightened during and after chemo.  For me, the spicier, the better.  For some reason, chemo had some weird effect on my taste buds that allowed taste to become more bland and dull, thus why I demanded more spicy foods in my small diet.  The cold, zesty salsa with the perfect crispy chips satisfied my hunger and need for excitement in my taste buds.

3. candy

While in the hospital, being hooked up to the IV fluids and chemo medicine made my mouth really dry.  I hated the feeling, and that feeling alone would make me even more nauseous.  In response to my dry mouth, of course I craved candy to help with the issue.  From sour gummy worms to Hot Tamales, my hospital room looked like a 7-year-old's dream piled up beside my bed.

4. flamin' hot cheetos

Once again, it was the spicier the better when it came to what I would eat.  Thus, Flaming Hot Cheetos were another one of my go-to foods during the recovery period after chemo treatment.  Bright red, cheesy finger tips and all, I would go through a whole bag with watery eyes and runny nose from the red Cheetos.  One upside to this guilty pleasure would be the fact that it would force me to drink a lot of water in response to my burning mouth.  I needed to stay hydrated and drink a lot of fluids, and an efficient way to get me to do so was eating a bag of Flaming Hot Cheetos.

Due to my lack of appetite during the queasy days of chemo, this list is extremely short.  My appetite would come back for a small window of time before it was time to be admitted right back into the hospital again for another hit of chemo, and during that time I ate anything and everything because I could.  So if you're going through chemo treatment, don't try to eat the healthiest foods out there or stick to some kind of strict diet.  It's okay to eat a giant cheese burger if you really want to.  For me, I had to literally stock up my body as if I were going into hibernation before my next round of chemotherapy.  So eat what you want whenever you want because you feel good.  Save the wimpy diet for the days with no appetite.  Unfortunately, it's a whole different story now that I'm in remission when it comes to food whatever, whenever.  So embrace the fact that you can do it now if you are still going through chemotherapy.

###Alexis