Chik - a - lay

Mealtime has been stressful for Henry lately. He sees the rest of us sitting down to eat, and knows that he's supposed to want to eat, but he really doesn't. He generally is able to come up with something that sounds good, for which we will go to the end of the earth to procure. He looks at it with great enthusiasm, but the second it hits his tongue, he spits it out. Taste buds take quite a beating from chemo, so nothing tastes quite right. The worst part about it is the look of betrayal on his face when he doesn't taste what he expected to taste - like someone secretly poisoned the pancakes we just rushed to make.

So far, he's been drinking about 6 ounces of juice per day, sips of milk (heavily fortified with half and half to boost the calories), a few bites of vanilla ice cream, and Nerds (a very tart candy). This morning he branched out to orange TicTacs. (Great, the one and a half calorie breath mint.)

Bryan brought home some ice cream cones from the grocery store today, to satisfy another craving Henry's had. We expected him to to take an obligatory bite and be done with it. To our surprise, he ate all of the ice cream and most of the cone. He even asked for a second one, but by the time it was ready, he was no longer interested. Still, it was the most that he'd eaten yet!

This evening we had some errands to run, and Henry requested Chik-a-lay (Chik-Fil-A to those of you who need translation.) This is his favorite fast food, and a regular stopping point during our commutes to Baltimore. He asked for his usual, and took a very big first bite. I expected it to come right back out, but instead he grinned and gave me a thumb's up sign and kept right on chewing. He finished almost a full serving. For dessert tonight he had another ice cream cone.

It's great to see him eat. He gets all the nutrition he needs through his TPN, but it's troubling as a parent to see a child not eat. For now we'll keep him on it, but if his appetite continues to pick up, we may cut it in half. We know he'll stop eating again during the next chemo, but we hope he'll be able to enjoy one of life's greatest pleasure for a few days first.