Tricky Nutrition

     When you are dealing with delayed gastric emptying you have unique issues when it comes to trying to find foods that you can digest easily and yet have proper nutrition as well as a variety of foods to choose from.

     Because your stomach empties slowly and you feel full early you should try to eat six small meals a day as opposed to three meals and supplement when possible with protein drinks. 

     You want to avoid saturated fats because they are hard to digest but our bodies do need a certain ammount of fat.  The good fats can be found in avacados, salmon, safflower oil, eggs (be careful, eggs also have sulfur in them and can cause issues with a slow digestion) and some nuts that can be made into pastes and spread on crackers.

     You also want to avoid fiber because it will definately cause you issues and often the result of cutting fiber is constipation.  To counter this you will want to make sure that you get enough liquids during the day in te form of fruit juices and water as well as being sure that your foods are well chewed.

     Following are some suggestions of foods that tend to be easier to digest and lower in saturated fats as well as a list of foods to avoid if possible.


Things to Avoid

Fruits- figs, dates, prunes, all dried fruits, all raw fruits (especially the peels) with a few exceptions

Fruit Juices- all citrus with pulp

Vegetables- all raw vegetables, beans, broccoli, corn, lettuce, cucumbers, pickles, anything that still has a peel on it

Grains- whole wheat, oatmeal, rye, cornmeal

Meats- beef, poultry dark meat, pork

Spreads- mayonnaise, peanut butter

Oils- peanut oil, corn oil

 All fried foods (this includes french fries)


Things to Eat

Fruits- canned fruit (except fruit salad with grapes and cherries), banana, avocados

Fruit Juices- Apple, Pear, any pulpless juices

Vegetables- all canned vegetables, any cooked vegetable as long as they are peeled first and are cooked until soft

Grains- white processed breads, cream of wheat, grits, potato bread

Meat- ground lamb, ground venison, ground buffalo, ground turkey breast (skinless boneless) ground chicken breast (skinless boneless)

Spreads- Nutella, greek yogurt as a mayo replacement

Oils- Safflower, Sunflower, Olive Oil

Foods that are broiled, steamed or baked in a manner that keeps it out of any juices.


Simple rules

     The trick to making sure that foods will be easy to digest is if you can cut it with a spoon you can probably eat it, remember to chew thoroughly and when in doubt leave it out.

     Your best friend will be a food diary where you write down what you eat and when you eat it, noting any increase of symptoms after eating.  This will not only help you find ‘trigger’ foods that do not seem to work for you but will help your Doctor track the progression of your disease and any changes that should be monitored.

     Sometimes even these foods are not tolerated, at which time you should consider trying stage one and stage two baby foods such as banana, sweet potato and apple.  They are not only much smoother and easy to digest but they come in convenient serving sizes.

     Most people find that they can tolerate protien suppliment drinks and well blended smoothies that are made with properly prepared fruits and yogurt with protien or weight gain powder added.  To prepare fruit for smoothies you want to cook it first to help start the breakdown of the protiens then freeze it in an ice tray or small cups for easy portioning. 

     Broths can also make a nutritious snack, but many commercail ones can have preservatives or too much sodium and bullion cubes can often be too spicy for a sensitive stomach.  An easy thing to do is to make your broth at home using your favorite recipe.  Simply make your broth then refrigerate overnight and in the morning remove the solidified fat then transfer to the freezer and freeze for 6 to 8 hours.  You can then use a clean paper towel to wipe the last of the fat off the surface.  You then reheat the broth and portion it into ice cube trays and refreeze overnight.  In the morning pop them out and place them in a zipper style freezer bag.  You can then take out what you want when you want it knowing exactly what is in it.  In a freezer bag they should keep about 6 months in the freezer.