Before I was diagnosed I drank sweet tea pretty much all of the time. I had some the other day and man was it good. My question is this...I have heard in the past that sweet tea isnt good for hydration. I have spoken with my nurse about this and she say she has never heard that and says she doesnt thin it will hurt me in any way to start drinking tea again. Does anyone know anything about this????

I always thought the caffeine in tea dehydrates you. I envy you because 4 mos post treatment, I still cannot taste the sugar in sweet tea and it used to be my drink of choice. It tastes like straight caffeine.

I agree ..it is the caffeine. AS far as tasting it ...these days I dont taste a whole lot and the Neuroma is only making it worse !

I drink iced tea all the time without any issues when we are out. At home Ingrid brews Green tea that is in the fridge all the time for me. While I still have plenty of water bottles around... in the car, at my desk etc., tea is a big part of my days and I have no issues related to it. While caffeine is related to dehydration, this is systemic and not localized to the tissues in your mouth.

The temp has been in triple digits around here and I have drunk gallons of tea with no ill effect. I have been working in the garden and doing other oouside things. It is my understanding that tea has less caffeine than coffee anyway. And yes, I wear my sun hat (grin)

Seems like I have read that sugar is not the best thing for cancer patients- "it feeds the cancer cells"- please correct me if I'm wrong- "sweet tea" in the South means lots of sugar added. Amy in the Ozarks

Like Brian we drink green ice tea all the time -- either brew it or buy from local store -- we make/use "diet" as we both watch sugar, Barry for his teeth's sake and me because I am slightly hypoglycemic. Green tea is one of the highest in antioxidants and may have a significant role in helping your body fight cancer.

According to our radiation nurse -- back when Barry was having treatment and getting amifostine, with its high requirement for pre-injection hydration -- any liquid was OK including Jello. He stuck to water pretty much but there was no restriction on tea. I recently read an article that essentially debunked the "caffeine-containing drinks are not hydrating" mantra, they found any liquid helped maintain hydration although plain old H2O was still the best!

Barry did find that, during treatment and a few months' afterwards, drinks high in sugar made his mouth feel "dry" -- this included some of these so-called "Vitamin Waters" and similar energy drinks. He tried these a few months ago and found they no longer had that effect.

Gail

My wife searched it up and found this article;

http://www.news.com.au/story/0,23599,20246225-36398,00.html

And also this;

Drinking tea has health benefits
Submitted by Khalid on Sun, 2006/08/27 - 11:59. Science
A new study shows that tea is mostly beneficial to the health.

Tea cuts down the chances for heart attacks, has flouride in it and hence good for teeth, and has antioxidants in it as well, which although not conclusively cancer-preventing, has other benefits.

Tea is also a source of fluid.

The myth that tea causes dehydration, because of its caffeine content, has been debunked.

All this is good news to me, since tea is my main source of fluid.

The only downsides are the caffeine content of tea, which is less than coffee, and its prevention of iron absorption if taken around meal times.

That pretty much sums it up for me. Im drinking tea again!!!!...LOL

White tea sweetened with fruit juice was one of the first things I found I really enoyed after cancer treatment and it soothed my mouth irritation and cut through the still-present phlegm. Apparently one of the ROs working at the hosp. where I got radiated had worked someplace in the South before and the nurses there recommended decaf sweet tea as a drink to sooth mouth irritation for oral cancer radiation patients. I'm sure they recommended brusing teeth well after that.

I still drink green and white tea. I couldn't for a while when my xerostomia was at its worst because they felt like they dried out my mouth too much (which tea does do) but now that I have some saliva again, I try to have green or white tea at least once a day.

Nelie

I encouraged my husband to try some sweet tea today to see if he could tolerate it and he did. I was thrilled. He was just sipping water by mouth and the rest through his peg. He is finally starting to eat one small decent meal a day. Thanks for the suggestion.LJ

Prior to my cancer mess, I was talking to a doctor in Utah, where I had been hiking in summer, about coffee and whether it counted towards hydration, what with having caffeine in it, a known diuretic.

He told me that indeed it counted in my case, because I used it every day and my body had adjusted to its effects. That wouldn't be so for an occasional user of caffeine.

I am so glad LJ that he was able to tolerate the tea. He, as well as I, have been struggling ever since we finished treatments and something as small as tea can make a world of difference in our day. Let him know that if I find anything else that I can tolerate I will post here or PM you with what it is and please do the same on your end also.

Thanks,
Billy

Thanks Billy, I appreciate it. Yesterday he wanted to go out for a milkshake, I was thrilled. Ended up with a banana cream blizzarrd from Dairy Queen. He ate 1/4 of it and said it started to burn his mouth. So it is a lot of trail and error. He was hungry for beef strogonoff yesterday, I was happy to make it for him. He ate 1 cup and said it didn't taste as good as he remembered it. I told him thats ok at least he is trying to eat. I guess what is old is new and new is old if that makes any sense. Hope you had a good week-end. LJ

That is so awesome LJ. My wife says she knows how you feel watching your husband eat and enjoy himself. I am the same way as him when it comes to cold things. They hurt my mouth and hurt going down also. I have to get a drink, put ice in it, take the ice back out before I can drink it. Tell him not to give up on the strogannoff and to try and remember what it tasted like before and keep that thought in his mind when he is eating it. I have surgery on Wednesday but I would love to talk to him before I have to go in. I will PM my number if he would like to call or you can call if you would like.

Billy