Hi all, I was really surprised the other night when I was eating bbq ribs and fries with ketchup. I'm in early stages of treatments so far and was surprised that eating these items would be painful to my tongue.

I found out today from my rn that tomato based products, some fruits (i.e., oranges, limes, lemons), can aggravate the tongue.

I haven't noticed (may have missed) any postings regarding this. Does anyone else experience this problem??

Cricket.

Oh, good grief, yes! Yeah, you missed it. Pete 228 had some great food tips as have others. Mexican, Italian, anything tomato based or citrus is off limits for a while. Gotta' watch out for the acid content. Fries (chips) are salty - say goodbye to them for a while too. Ever notice that they have sharp edges? Neither did I; turns out that they do.

Pretty soon you'll be left with mac and cheese, chicken noodle soup, instant oatmeal, scrambled eggs (no salt or pepper, please), Ensure - nothing remotely interesting or tasty. Bread crusts and cookies (biscuits) are grainy (who knew?); ice cream may be too cold, coffee and tea may be too hot. The list goes on and on.

Don't worry, you'll get over it. I'm about 7 weeks post-treatment and add a little more to the menu each day. I can't do acidic things yet but yesterday I added a ham and cheese sandwich on soft wheat with mayo and light butter - pure nirvana. Someday soon I'll add a little Dijon and lettuce and switch mild cheddar for aged Swiss.

You started rads on the 19th, right? You'll be finished sometime around July 10th? It'll get worse before getting better, but you know you can do it. Take comfort and advice from those on this board who've experienced it all and are here to advise us.

I kept trying to think of my good prognosis, not what I could or couldn't eat; we're very fortunate, my friend, it could have been much much worse.

Love your 'tude! Mine's been the same and I think I've only had two really bad moments - each was because of over-researching, predicting the worst rather than accepting the present and the good prognosis. My doc added to it by saying that treatment was 'brutal.' When he turned out to be wrong and I asked him about it, he said that it was better to be overly cautious rather than to expect the best. F***er! Isn't there a middle ground? A lot of unnecessary angst. I'm too old for that!

Best of luck. Contact me any time!

Mimi

Dont know how to do the quote thing in these posts but,

"he said it was better to be overly cautious rather than to expect the best. F***er!"

Classic .

I'm 4 years plus past treatments and still can't handle citrus, though I do OK with most tomato-based sauces. BBQ sauce varies a lot depending on what they put in it, you need to experiment with mild sauces.

Every case is different and you have to use a lot of trial and error, but I think most of us who are veterans of RT in the mouth and throat share your intolerance for acidic foods.

basically keep away from anything with spices in especially curry chilli pepper or vinegar etc.even chocolate burns my moth too.shirl xxx