Oh nutrition and weight gain, I know thee well. Over the last year I've gained 30lbs of lean muscle mass, got injured and drank obscene amounts eggnog over the holidays and gained "unnecessary" weight to which I've finally "shed".

When you look at "nutrition" or diet, it's not just about caloric intake, or macronutrient (fat, protein, carbohydrates) breakdowns etc, it's also about absorption and timing, think about it as the 3rd piece of the pie. Weight gain and loss has a lot to do with hormone balances in the body, especially in the cancer patient.

Cachexia, or cancer related weight loss is an interesting subject and one not entirely understood by our medical community. Basically your immune response to the cancer releases hormones that make absorbing nutrition difficult and redirects amino acids to immune function as opposed to rebuilding muscle tissues etc. So we experience a "wasting" effect as our body are in a heightened catabolic state and begins to breakdown it's own lean muscle mass for the necessary amino acids not being absorbed in digestion.

There are ways to battle this obviously, the greatest one is an eating schedule, eating smaller meals and proper digestive support (probiotics). Understanding that a calorie isn't just a calorie, understanding that your body can only absorb so much at one time, particularly protein as Cheryl pointed out it can be rough on the kidneys.

There are great free tools available now that can help track nutrition if you have a smart phone, personally I use "My Calorie Counter" (available for iPhone or Android) so that I can track not just my calories but my macronutrient intake as well.

Top level athletes generally are religious about what they put into their bodies and when. There is a strategy that body builders and top trainers use called "The Golden Ratio" which calls for your macro nutrient breakdown to be 40-50% carbohydrates, 20-30% fat, and 20-30% protein. They also break their intake down into six meals to help with absorption, and to me this strategy makes sense for cancer patients in the struggle and those in recovery if you consider that both athletes and patients bodies are being broken down and using nutrition and rest to rebuild them.

Tips I would recommend:

Eat 6x per day
.55-.70 grams of protein per pound of body weight per day.
protein of no more than 20-30 grams at any one sitting

Complex carbohydrates like multigrains (I blend oatmeal), green leafy vegetables, fresh or frozen berries(solid, juiced or blended)

Fats! Olive oil (omega6), walnuts (omega6 & 3) Shell Fish, fish (mackeral is great if you can eat it, salmon etc...) coconut oil and coconut milk.


Hope that helps, good luck!