Does anyone have a one stop shopping list of immediate post surgery foods to stock?

My wife likes to prepare way in advance, and is on my case for such a list, and so far all my onlne and brochure sources are a sort of grab-bag of lists, indicating foods to avoid, foods to thicken output, foods to thin output, etc- I was wondering if anyone had a link or a pdf to a one stop shopping list of good immediate post ostomy surgery staples.

With UC I have been paleo / low carb because, for many/most years this has kept my symptoms and medication needs (steroids being mostly the only med I could ever tolerate anyway) at a minimum, but I realize that in the surgery recovery, certain high glycemic carbs are probably going to be helpful- even be needed, temporarily, as well as stuff like (unsweetened) applesauce.

i have another WOCN consult coming up and will take a notebook and build a list per their advice too.

Thanks.

Post Edited (Probiotic) : 4/14/2013 4:14:06 PM (GMT-6)

I printed that out a few weeks ago, alot of great info in there.

I recommend simple foods, Stouffer's meals are ideal in portion. For example, roast chicken or turkey, with mashed potatoes. Meat loaf is another. Chicken or turkey pot pies are yet another example. To round all of this out, you can easily keep bananas, applesauce, cottage cheese, canned soups on hand.

But skip chili, pizza, cookies, candy, nuts and the like until you know you can tolerate them, even if you want them in the worst way possible (we've all had cravings).

My post surgery meals once my gut calmed down (I was on liquids for 14 days), were the Stouffer meals and simple turkey/cheese sub sandwiches.

look up GI soft diets. An easy way to describe it is anything you can cut with a fork.
So just think about all the normal foods you eat and like and then see if they pass the GI soft test. You will be shocked to find out that you will be able to eat a lot of variety by the time you come home.

also - if your wife makes casseroles.. have her make some in advance and freeze them. Then there is a healthy dish ready to go - for both of you - as you both will be recovering from your surgery!

Thanks, everyone, great suggestions. Pluot/Liz- that blog piece was good. As a low carb paleo-er too it is tough to fathom going the other direction suddenly, if largely temporarily but I can see that there's no reason for me to deny myswlf well cooked soft (but non gassy) veggies early on either. I do want to keeoavoiding processed foods of any sort as much as possible- for life- but an exception he or there while in hospital isnt going to end the world, vs having a blockage.

yeah Pro, I should probably clarify that because of the severity of my flare I didn't eat fruits or veggies for several months before surgery either, so I was slower to reincorporate them than others can or should be.

My hospital and surgeon seem to be far at the end of the spectrum as far as conservative diets go -- I was told to stay on GI soft, which is way more restrictive than low residue, for 10 days after discharge, which meant 15 days post-op. Obviously others did not get that advice and have done fine, but I was coming from a very serious "scared of food" place and it was easier for me to go slowly (e.g. during my flare I once tried a 1/4 cup of mashed banana and it touched off extremely bad stomach pains and arthritis that lasted for about 36 hours, on top of normal flare symptoms).

I can't remember exactly when I was able to eat what in the hospital, but I know I that my small intestine woke up fairly soon and that by the last couple of days of my 5-day hospital stay I was eating sandwiches with turkey, and cheese, eggs, muffins, oatmeal, salmon, chicken and potatoes without peels. Once I got home I just stayed away from high-residue foods (the typical things on the no-no list like nuts, fibrous veggies, sausage with casings, mushrooms etc.) but I ate everything else. I ate lean meats like chicken and fish and even roast beef made in the crock-pot so it was very tender. I did fine with ground beef and had sausage without casings. I ate ravioli and other pasta, pizza without any veggies on it, rice dishes, muffins, cereals that aren't very fibrous like Chex and canned veggies like carrots, green beans and beets. I even went to Chipotle within the first couple of weeks after surgery and had a really basic burrito bowl with rice, chicken, cheese and a tiny bit of salsa. My doctors had me on a lactose-free and very strict low-residue diet during my severe flare in the hospital, but once I had my ostomy I was able to reintroduce dairy products right away with no issues whatsoever. One thing was that my appetite wasn't the greatest right after surgery, so I tended to eat pretty small portions of all these things.

I also was found to be protein deficient post-surgery which hindered my healing a bit. I had to eat a ton of protein so I tried to eat eggs, whey protein shakes with soy milk or regular milk, Greek yogurt, meat etc. every day.

As far as processed foods, remember that there are choices out there that don't have a lot of strange mystery ingredients. I ate a lot of Lundberg Farms risotto after surgery. It is a boxed meal, but all the ingredients are recognizable. Whole Foods has a lot of low-residue pasta etc. options that are not full of artificial ingredients (including some that were gluten free which I needed because I have celiac disease).

Also, I remember stocking up before surgery as well but it turned out it wasn't necessary because I loved going to the grocery store after surgery. My mom came from out-of-state for a couple of weeks after my surgery and once I got home it seemed that we made a trip to the store almost everyday just for fun. My surgery was in the winter, so a short trip to the store provided the perfect amount of walking for me. Plus, I had been so restricted on what I could eat... I loved walking the aisles and knowing that I now had so many options:)

Those little trips to the grocery store are really good for getting out and to get moving!