Hi Nelie,

I am happy to hear from you. I hope you are doing well. I had been away from the forum for while tending to my wife. She has still alot of problems with phlegm and she chockes because she is unable to swallow the phlegm and it does trigger her gag reflex.

Likewise she does a lot of throat clearing and spitting evary day to get rid of some of that very thick phlegm. I spoke to her GI doctor today and seems to think that the phlegm is the cause of the nausea.

He suggested that she bend her head down when the phlegm backs up in her throat to make the phlegm easier to swallow. Because of swallowing problems she had her second esophagus dilation today because she had a stricture which was found through a swallowing test a couple of months ago.

The GI doctor says she should be able to eat soft foods now. We will try and see.

We also feed her one can of Jevity at time through the siringe without using the plunger so that the Jevity flows at its own rate. Sometimes I mix the Jevity with a 1.5 ounce container of Benecalorie so she gets another 350 cal per feeding. But sometimes she vomits right after the feeding.

I also think that the nausea is aggravated by the pain killers. According to her ENT she still has a lot of irritation in her mouth from the chemoradiation and the pain is still a 4 on scale on 1 to 10 while she is on the painkillers. Her pain management doctor says to continue to use the painkillers.

We are going to see the pain management doctor in a couple of weeks and we will see what he recommends about continuing the use of the painkillers at this stage.

It has been a rough road for us both physically and mentally. I still have to fight bouts of depression. I count my lucky blessings to have found this site and the very caring and wonderful people here that are so kind and willing to help.

Nelie, I really appreciate your help and input.

Vin