Why I blend real food

There is an ongoing debate between those who put formula (like Ensure or Jevity) in their tubes and those who eat real food (what we call a "blenderized" diet). Many people have no choice in the matter. For example, there are ng feeding tubes that get to your stomach through your nose. These tubes are thinner, and I'm no expert but I'd imagine it's a lot harder to push a steak through your nose than my relatively larger Percutaneous Endoscopic Gastrostomy (didn't think I knew what it stood for, did you?), or PEG, tube.

This little man is starting the feeding tube diet early

There are also J-tubes (jejunostomy) that are inserted directly into your intestines. These tubies are also often restricted to a certain diet.

Interesting side note: the first recorded use of a feeding tube was at least 3500 years ago when Greek and Egyptian physicians used reeds and animal bladders to rectally feed fluids, like wine, to patients to treat a variety of ailments. Yeah, the first tubies were butt chuggers. Our society has progressed so much since then.

Yet there are many other tubies who have a choice about what they eat. When I first ate exclusively through my tube in 2009, I was adamantly opposed to the blenderized diet. I remember sending my sister a sharply worded e-mail explaining how my day was filled with tube feedings. Each Ensure-Plus is about 350 calories. My nutritionist wanted me to take in seven Ensures a day. In the morning, Betsy would crush my pills for me. I hadn't yet discovered the syringe holder yet, so I would have to carefully balance my nearly useless left hand on the edge of the table with my syringe grasped between my weak thumb and forefinger. I would carefully pour my pills and formula into the tube, filling it up nearly to the top (spills were common in those days). The tube wasn't high enough for the liquid to go down by gravity, so I would take the tube in my right hand and raise it up until it emptied. Then I would clamp off the tube, put it back in my left hand, and repeat this until all the formula was gone and I'd thoroughly flushed the tube with water. The tube holds about 1/3 of a cup of fluid. The Ensure, plus water to thin it out, plus my pills, came out to 2 1/3 cups, plus about a cup of water to flush. I was looking at ten or eleven syringe-fulls of fluid. Add this to the fact that our pill crusher was not so good (now I use a mortar and pestle. much easier and I can do it by myself without bothering Betsy) so I'd often get clogs. Because of this, I'd often end up sitting at the table much longer trying to coax the pills down the tube. It was maddening, and I was going to grad school here at the University of Tennessee so I was at my wit's end, often tube feeding in my parked car or in the classroom between classes.

I didn't see how actually preparing a meal with real food, then pushing it through the tube would help. Real food blends are thick and require a plunger to physically force it into the stomach. I couldn't push it in with one hand, so I would need Betsy to feed me every time. Also, I didn't yet have a Vitamix, and my low-end blender couldn't blend up meals as smoothly as I needed. With real food, I had clogs much more often so eating was a long, frustrating ordeal for Betsy and I.

I experimented with pumps to gradually pump in the food over time but with a pump I'd be chained to one spot for an hour. I was given a portable pump to carry in a small bag, but clogs were common. Finally, I started doing feedings at night while I slept. I switched to a different formula because Ensure was making me nauseous. The new one was TwoCal HN. It was 500 calories a can rather than 350. TwoCal also made me nauseous. I was steadily losing weight with no idea what to do.

Don't they look delicious?

Then, at the end of 2009, I started looking online for answers. Surely there were other people with feeding tubes out there. Did they share any of my problems? I became aware of a huge community of people all over the world in my predicament. Mostly, I've found that it is mothers caring for their tube-fed children. But there are also thousands of adults from all age groups. Many of these people were finding that they, or their loved ones, were responding much better to blended, real food. What matters is not just how many calories you take in, but the type of calories. Ensure and TwoCal are able to pack hundreds of calories into an 8-ounce can because they use A LOT of sugar. Then they pump in some vitamins and minerals and call it "total nutrition". Most nutritionists agree with formula companies, and further argue that putting real food into the tubes is not sterile. Without saliva from the mouth to help destroy bad bacteria and start to break down the food, tubies are opening themselves up to serious GI illness.

Regardless of the risk, I was willing to try anything. Also, even though I thought it would be time-consuming, I was excited about actually preparing a real meal rather than opening a can. I'd heard all sorts of good things about the Vitamix online. I was hesitant to pay $700 for a brand new blender, but I remembered that a friend in Colorado, Julie, had a Vitamix that she said she rarely used. I asked Julie if she'd donate her Vitamix to me and she agreed (thanks again Julie and Mike if you're reading this!!! It's a little more beat up after daily use, but running fine!). I was in business!

I think my first meal was chicken I'd softened up real nice in the slow cooker (I didn't fully appreciate the power of the Vitamix and thought soft foods were the way to go). What a difference real food made!!! No nausea, and I could take much more volume into my stomach without feeling sick. With Ensure, I could barely handle 24 oz of fluids, but with a blender I could do two, even three, times that amount. I felt full and satisfied after my meal whereas formula never left me sated, only sick and dreading the next feeding.

My religion is blenderized diets and this is my God

I started experimenting with my meals. I didn't really care about being healthy and this was before I started eating gluten-free (more about that in a future post), so I was putting donuts together with cheeseburgers and chips, or pizza and wine with cookies. You name it, the Vitamix would blend it. I got excited about food again. For the first time, I started cooking for the family.

Betsy and I were both seriously lacking when it came to cooking (I mostly married her for her looks). I started getting recipes online and cooking dinner every night. I have grown to love cooking, even though I never taste the food I cook. Betsy and Grace are my taste testers. If they don't like my meals, I just put on the guilt trip. "That's fine," I mumble forlornly, "I slaved away all day in the kitchen making a meal I'll never be able to enjoy, and you think it's a little too salty. WHY DON'T YOU MAKE YOUR OWN DAMN MEAL NEXT TIME?!? OH, YOU WANNA CRY NOW?!?"

Sorry, where was I? Right, real food is awesome! I only eat 3 meals a day, like a normal person. I do have a can of formula in the morning to save some time, but no more nausea. My syringe holder allows me to feed myself wherever I find a table. The mortar and pestle allow me to crush my own pills. I enjoy a level of independence I never had in 2009.

And now, for more than a year, I've been taking the Vitamix out with me. It serves as my "teeth" and lets me eat with Betsy and Grace.

BTW, the whole time I've been eating real food from a blender (more than three years now), I've never had a single problem with GI issues from "non sterile" blends.