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momma_d_gw

Good Liquified Food Ideas?

momma_d
16 years ago

Greetings to my old pals here and a big hello to those of you that I haven't officially 'met' yet.

Have any of you ever had the lovely experience of having your jaws wired shut? My 16 year old son was the unlucky recipient of an unintentional swing by another boy Friday night. His jaw was fractured rather badly. An open fracture in the front and a closed fracture further back. He had surgery yesterday to realign and wire everything back together and his jaw is wired shut for the next six weeks. His dining pleasure is restricted to anything I can liquify enough to fit through a 60 ml syringe.

He's about 6' 2" and weighs 145lbs. He weighed 150 before this happened and really can't afford to lose a whole lot more weight. He's your typical long, lanky teenager that hasn't filled out his frame yet. I'm going up to the local GNC to ask about supplements to add to his food so I can boost calories and protein.

Anyone out there have any sage advice or similar experience to share? I'm having a hard time thinking pepperoni pizza will blend very well..........

Laurie

Comments (18)

  • turkeytaker
    16 years ago

    Ensure, pudding, cream/cheese soups, gravy and mashed potatoes, sauce and orzo, that premade cheesecake filling whipped with cream.

    I had a horrible experience with my wisdom teeth extraction and ended up not being able to eat solids for about three weeks.

    Hope everything turns out okay with your son. Hope he gave a swing back to the other kid. :)

    Stacy

  • momma_d
    Original Author
    16 years ago

    Thanks, Stacy. I'm making mashed potatoes and hamburger gravy for dinner tonight - that should be pretty easy to liquify and is one of his favorite things to eat. He's going to get tired of milk shakes, smoothies, etc pretty soon. I bought some weight gain powder today and he said it tasted pretty good. I mixed it with some strawberries, vanilla yogurt, a banana and some milk. So far, the worst thing for him is the liquid amoxicillin. He was on cephalexin before the surgery but it wasn't available in liquid form, so the doc switched him. He squirts in in his mouth, makes an awful face, then chases it with some juice. It's a good thing the liquid vicodin doesn't taste bad :) You should see the assortment of syringes on the kitchen counter! Some for food, some for antibiotics, some for pain meds, some for juice - it looks like a flippin' pharmacy...........

  • michigoose
    16 years ago

    oh jeeze! And here I was going to suggest beer and scotch! Sounds horrible. Make those mashed potatoes with cream in it, and also gravy on top...pan gravy preferably. You're right, it isn't going to satisfy his chewing desires.... Poor kid. And here Meg is complaining as she has gone 2 years without gum! Vicodin always upsets my stomach. Yuck.

  • momma_d
    Original Author
    16 years ago

    The hamburger gravy and mashed potatoes were a hit! I added a little milk in the blender and it turned out just the right consistency for him to suck up in the giant syringe. He slurped up 5 syringes full and said it was the best he'd ever had - LOL. We learned this morning that scrambled eggs are NOT suitable for this type of diet. They were downright yucky looking and according to Evan, they were downright nasty to try to gag down. Tonight I'm trying some chicken, rice and gravy. We'll see how that works.

    Good thing the kid's a chocoholic like his Mom. He's in chocolate nirvana with all the milkshakes. And, I'm extremely grateful that the vicodin doesn't bother his stomach at all. Poor guy has already gone through one bottle of it. The doc had me double the dosage because we couldn't get the post op pain under control. He woke up in tears this morning :( He's a really stoic kid, so he must have felt like he!! times two for him to cry. I cried right along with him.

    We go back to the doc in the morning for another xray and follow up. In the meantime, I'm developing a deep relationship with my blender. It's my new best friend........

  • ntgerald
    16 years ago

    I salute your patience, tenacity, and love.

  • cbarry
    16 years ago

    Hmmm, on this kind of diet, nutrition (as you know) will be more important than the actual food items (blended pasta? yuck!). So the protein mixes from the sports/health store is a great idea! While those things blended with milk are good, (does he like fruit?) a couple of scoops of protein mix added to everything, including (frozen or fresh) strawberries (too bad 16 yr olds shouldn't have daquirries) will be a wonderful health boost. Add a few scoops to the next gravy/potato mix. Someone probably suggested yogurt. Applesauce? Baby food? I'm reaching now-

    The best of recovery to the both of you!
    Carolyn

  • michigoose
    16 years ago

    Of course the other problem will be getting enough fiber into him...but don't tell him I said that. Refried beans?

    Meg grimaced, and then suggested greenbeans with blue cheese (one of her favorites, wierd kid that she is). She thought of pasta (again one of her favorites) but admitted it would look pretty bad when blended...but she still felt that it would taste good....Avacados...guacamole without the chip!

    How in heaven's name did he get sooo messed up?

    Oh, a warning from when I had a soft palate reduction preparatory for me getting a partial....if his mouth is sutured/wounded on the inside...best to stay away from spicy things...I just about flipped and wanted to rip the roof of my mouth off when I ate baked beans. The clove in it I think it was, irritated the raw tissue and sort of burned...Not nice.

    Plum sauce :)

  • momma_d
    Original Author
    16 years ago

    I laughed when I read the refried beans, Lisa! He loves bean burritos but I figured that flour tortillas would just become glue in the blender. This morning after the gross egg experiment, he wanted some bean burrito without the tortilla. I heated up a can of refried beans, added some cheese and some Taco Bell mild sauce and voila! A tasty fiber filled meal that he really liked.The sauce was mild and it didn't bother his mouth at all. He only has a few sutures and the gum that was open from the original wound is already healing up pretty well. Gum tissue heals so fast it amazes me!

    And even though he doesn't like oatmeal, I've been making it and adding fruit and vanilla yogurt and he thinks it's pretty yummy. I was worried about the 'plugging up' that pain meds can cause but everything is moving through like it should. He's been getting at least one smoothie full of fresh fruit every day. So far, so good. Too bad the plums aren't ripe yet :)

    As to how this happened..............He went to a friend's to spend the night Friday. Unbeknownst to me, there were no parents there. Some of the boys were drinking (Evan wasn't, I was rather surprised as he is a 16 year old testing his independence). But all the other idiots that were there said he was sober. A carful of party crashers showed up around midnight and were being really obnoxious. A couple of them were in Evan's face and he was backing up to walk away. He lost his balance, flailed his arms to trying to catch himself before he fell. One of his arms whizzed past another boys face and the boy thought Evan was taking a swing at him. The boy came up swinging and landed one smack on Evan's jaw, breaking it into three pieces. The kid that hit him is a boy we've known for years. They were in little league together. His Mom and him feel terrible about it and are coming over tomorrow to visit with Evan and talk to us about how Ryan is going to reimburse us for the $3000 deductible we had to pay before our insurance kicks in. He may have to be my husband's free concrete laborer for the summer. Evan was at fault, too for putting himself in the situation in the first place. We're going to have to figure out a way for him to work off the 20% that the insurace doesn't cover. It was a stupid teenage screw up that I hope they all learned something from. I'm just glad that it was only a broken jaw and something that the doc could fix. It could have been so much worse...............

    A good thing that has come out of it is that Ev and I are spending some fun time together (which is as rare as hens teeth these days). We spent the whole night tonight with him playing the Godfather game on his Xbox with me following along and helping him to know who was who and what it was all about. I'm a video game idiot but I know my Godfather movies! We had a lot of laughs and shared a milkshake. Good times!

    I'll give a report tomorrow after the visit with the doc. Off to bed for me. I'm whupped from all the...

  • momma_d
    Original Author
    16 years ago

    I laughed when I read the refried beans, Lisa! He loves bean burritos but I figured that flour tortillas would just become glue in the blender. This morning after the gross egg experiment, he wanted some bean burrito without the tortilla. I heated up a can of refried beans, added some cheese and some Taco Bell mild sauce and voila! A tasty fiber filled meal that he really liked.The sauce was mild and it didn't bother his mouth at all. He only has a few sutures and the gum that was open from the original wound is already healing up pretty well. Gum tissue heals so fast it amazes me!

    And even though he doesn't like oatmeal, I've been making it and adding fruit and vanilla yogurt and he thinks it's pretty yummy. I was worried about the 'plugging up' that pain meds can cause but everything is moving through like it should. He's been getting at least one smoothie full of fresh fruit every day. So far, so good. Too bad the plums aren't ripe yet :)

    As to how this happened..............He went to a friend's to spend the night Friday. Unbeknownst to me, there were no parents there. Some of the boys were drinking (Evan wasn't, I was rather surprised as he is a 16 year old testing his independence). But all the other idiots that were there said he was sober. A carful of party crashers showed up around midnight and were being really obnoxious. A couple of them were in Evan's face and he was backing up to walk away. He lost his balance, flailed his arms to trying to catch himself before he fell. One of his arms whizzed past another boys face and the boy thought Evan was taking a swing at him. The boy came up swinging and landed one smack on Evan's jaw, breaking it into three pieces. The kid that hit him is a boy we've known for years. They were in little league together. His Mom and him feel terrible about it and are coming over tomorrow to visit with Evan and talk to us about how Ryan is going to reimburse us for the $3000 deductible we had to pay before our insurance kicks in. He may have to be my husband's free concrete laborer for the summer. Evan was at fault, too for putting himself in the situation in the first place. We're going to have to figure out a way for him to work off the 20% that the insurace doesn't cover. It was a stupid teenage screw up that I hope they all learned something from. I'm just glad that it was only a broken jaw and something that the doc could fix. It could have been so much worse...............

    A good thing that has come out of it is that Ev and I are spending some fun time together (which is as rare as hens teeth these days). We spent the whole night tonight with him playing the Godfather game on his Xbox with me following along and helping him to know who was who and what it was all about. I'm a video game idiot but I know my Godfather movies! We had a lot of laughs and shared a milkshake. Good times!

    I'll give a report tomorrow after the visit with the doc. Off to bed for me. I'm whupped from all the...

  • momma_d
    Original Author
    16 years ago

    Don't know why that got posted twice - sorry 'bout that!

  • organic_kermit
    16 years ago

    Ya, I've done it after surgery, and it all remind's me of toddler food.
    I was all about potato leek soup. With my son I would do pasta but put yellow squash and carrots in the sauce and put way more sauce than normal on it before you blend it. I would eat what he didn't. You know you could buy some jars of baby food and use that. Some of them are tasty.
    Shani

  • Judybird2014
    16 years ago

    nothing u moms won't do; I salute you, too:-)

    (can't get that premade cheesecake filling, whipped w/CREAM, out of my mind, thx, stacy)

  • qylliam
    16 years ago

    My personal recommendation is butternut squash soup. I made huge batches of it when I had my wisdom teeth out. It's delicious and good fiber.

    Also, I'm enjoying the expression "Rare as hens teeth".

    Steph

  • momma_d
    Original Author
    16 years ago

    Us Mom's don't need to be saluted :) We're just doing what Mom's do. Sometimes it's a pain in the a$$, other times it's just plain wonderful.

    It looks like we'll be developing an up close and personal relationship with the oral surgeon. We have to go in once a week so he can re-string the high tension rubber bands that hold Evan's upper and lower jaws together and have xrays taken to check the progess of the bone mending.The wires that he used during the surgery to keep the jaws together have a tendency to loosen over time. He said the rubber bands work much better. So, for the next six weeks, a trip to his office will be added to our schedule.

    I wish I could get him to eat butternut squash soup! Both of my kids loved it when they were babies but hate it now. I have a pot of lentils on the stove cooking right now. He loves lentil soup and it'll do fab in the blender. We discovered that KFC chicken (without the skin), mashed potatoes and gravy are quite tasty after a trip through the blender. He's a typical 16 year old that loves junk food and the KFC was a good fix. His buddy joined him in the blenderized KFC last night. It was a pretty funny show of support.

    Thanks to all of you for your words of encouragement and ideas. I know we'll hit some speed bumps in the weeks to come but for now, it's all good.

  • michigoose
    16 years ago

    You mean it isn't ALWAYS a PITA? ;)

  • ntgerald
    16 years ago

    So, how are things by now?

  • momma_d
    Original Author
    16 years ago

    He's able to open his mouth just a tiny bit now. It's enough for him to be able to put teeny little bites of soft food in and smoosh it against the roof of his mouth to 'chew' it. He had a slice of pizza the other night - took him 35 minutes to get it all down - and he said it was the best pizza he'd ever eaten! His progress is coming along nicely. The oral surgeon said it's possible that four weeks might do the trick since youngsters heal so quickly. We go in Monday to have the rubberbands re-strung and they'll take another xray then.

    So far, so good. I'm actually surprised at how good his attitude has been. He had a little melt down a week or so ago but that was it.

  • kephart
    10 years ago

    I think I might be a life saver... I just had jack in the box tacos took the hard shell off... Put them in a blender with a lot of ranch and taco sauce. Blended it to almost liquids ... Here's the catch I went too foods co and I was looking for a turkey Baster we'll...I found a icing bag.. Best thing in the world I have had my jaw wired shut for a little over a week and haven't got too get much down but soups and shakes.. I think I can eat most of whatever I want with this as long as it's diluted with something like ranch.. Taco sauce ect...hope this helps someone...Tom I am going too get a chicken sandwich and put it in the blender with a lot of ranch... Oh another thing that was great was the little pies in a package with a little milk in the blender very satisfying...

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