Consulting a Dietitian

Although I have been taking myself down my own “road” to better eating, with my father’s recent cancer diagnosis this road has become much wider.  You see several years ago, I had the pleasure of hearing Squire Rushnell speak on his book series, When GodWinks, and have since read a few of his books.  What many of us call “coincidence”, I believe is a “Godwink” moment to guide us through this journey called life.  That being said, what started as my own “road” to better eating, has now become a “Godwink” of this new journey with cancer. 

Due to the type of cancer that we are dealing with and how it is directly affecting how the body processes and retains nourishment, my dad’s diet is extremely important.  Diet is important for every chemotherapy patient however, the doctors have stressed to us how key it truly is for my dad.  So for those that know me, that means I have been spending hours researching and reading.  I asked the oncology team if we could meet with a dietitian and I was told that although they had a dietitian on staff they actually encouraged us to contact our local Hy-Vee grocery store.  Did you know that every Hy-Vee has a dietitian on staff for customers to consult?  (our local Belton store has Megan Callahan) In fact, you can schedule a Personal Nutrition Shopping Assistance/Store Tour for FREE that will discuss specific dietary needs.  You can also use NuVal, a nutritional scoring system that determines the nutritional value of the food you buy….again for FREE.  You can take it further and receive private nutrition counseling for a nominal fee as well.

Additionally, I have been able to tweak my dad’s Advocare Supplement regiment to ensure that he is receiving optimum nutrition.  For example:  it was suggested that he take his multi-vitamin and drink Ensure and Gatorade daily.  So, we have had to switch him to the V100 Multi-Vitamin and rather then Ensure and Gatorade, he is drinking 1-2 Advocare Meal Replacement Shakes (not as a replacement but as an additional meal each day) and at least one Rehydrate daily (as it has a better nutritional make-up then Gatorade).  Although there is not enough scientific evidence to prove that nutritional supplements impact the cure for cancer, it is suggested that they be used.  Specifically, for my dad, several of his abnormal labs can be corrected by diet and vitamins so we are hoping to see a few normal results.  In fact, his nurse has been so impressed with what she has seen so far from Advocare, she has asked for some samples for herself to try.