Loss of taste

FormerMember
FormerMember
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My partner has Breast and Bone cancers our last Oncology Appointment we were told that they were stable. I don't know what that quite means?

My partner was diagnosed in May 2019 and she is on oral chemotherapy and has injections every month one for her bones and an oestrogen blocker.

She has lost her sense of taste and everything tastes bland. Is this usual. It seems like everything I cook for her is not good enough for her. I am really upset as she used to love my cooking. She is also disabled that's why I cook all meals.

Thanks in advance. 

  • Hi and welcome to Carers. Please try not to feel upset at your partner's lack of taste. I've heard of taste going many times and it robs the joy of eating, making it just a necessity to survive. It's good to hear that the cancer is stable, I think it means that it's not spreading at the moment. It might help to pop into the Breast Cancer Group, you'll also find support from who has a lot of information to share following his partner's breast cancer. I've paged him so he might be in contact.

    Thinking of you,

    LoobyLou
    If you find dust in my house, write your name in it. When the signatures overlap I'll get the polish. 

    Click here to see how to add details to your profile. It helps everyone to see a little about you

  • FormerMember
    FormerMember

    Morning 

    So sorry to read about your wife, sounds like you both have had a tough few months :-/

    Thanks for the 'tag' 

    Stable means nothing much has changed, or by very little from any previous scans/tests; which is a good sign.

    As for the taste issues this is very common with chemotherapy whether intravenous or tablet form (Capecitabine ?) Food can taste metallic and/or have a slimy cardboard texture when chewed Stuck out tongue closed eyes

    My wife had this during chemo and what helped for was eating a piece of fresh pineapple just before a meal to kick start her taste buds. Tinned is more convenient but may taste 'tinned' so fresh is better in that way and can be quite soothing straight from the fridge.

    If your wife has some mouth ulcers pineapple may feel sore, in this case a Ginger Nut biscuit is almost as good at easing the metallic taste, we got through a lot of both Hugging

    Most with this problem tend to go one of two ways - Eating bland foods like Cereals, Pasta, Rice, Porridge, Creamy Soups, Cottage Cheese etc .

    J went the other way and really spiced things up to get some flavour from her food, not necessarily to create heat but to bring out flavours - we lived of curries and chilli based meals for about 4 months.

    It's trying to find what works and what makes this taste worse and going with that.

    There is a 90 page Cancer Recipe book produced by Macmillan covering topics like taste; I'll have a hunt around the site and attach it below if I find it Thumbsup

    Just click the cover to read/download the pdf.

    Hope this is of some help, take care, G n' J

  • FormerMember
    FormerMember in reply to FormerMember

    Thank you for your help .