Fighting with food: nausea, fatigue and repulsion transform this couple’s love of food.

In this first-person story, an Edible Sacramento reader and local restaurant worker describes the heartache of his wife’s battle with cancer and the loss of appetite that accompanied her treatment. This article is a reflection on the shared love for food that brought them together and the way the couple’s relationship with food changed for better and for worse.

Complicated. Painful. This is what became of our relationship with food when my wife Robin began her cancer treatment.

For years, our world has revolved around food. I learned to cook from my first-generation Norwegian grandmother, who learned Italian cooking from her friends and extended family in New York in the 1950s. She taught me to cook meatballs, Old World gravies, and authentic cheesecakes from scratch. I called it “manigot” for years until high school when a good Midwestern adult tried to correct me: “It’s manicotti.” Now, in my 40s, my world revolves around food. Through my non-profit work, people often join us at our home to talk over homemade tiramisu and braised short ribs. In my day job, I manage and wait tables at an upscale restaurant, as I have intermittently done since college.

Relationship with Food

A strong relationship with food is fundamental to my 20-year marriage with Robin. When we first met, I was a senior in college with my own studio apartment and working at a restaurant. She was a 19-year-old freshman in the dormitory, where she was left to eat cafeteria food. We were friends. I thought she was cute and she needed to eat something that didn’t taste like glue. When she called me, I took her out to some of the best hidden gems in the Minneapolis restaurant scene of yore.

Twenty-four years into our relationship, and now with two teenage daughters, food is still at the center of it all. We still date each other, going out two to three times a month. We don’t go to clubs—with our fundamentalist Christian upbringing, we can’t dance. We enjoy mild hiking, but we can’t do that for three hours on a Saturday night with kids and dogs eagerly awaiting our return. We are out of touch with local music, and while we love theatre, the cost is astronomical. Food is what draws us in. We go to nice restaurants, always trying something new, and then talk about our future, our plans, and yes, the food. 

Cancer Diagnosis

That was until a diagnosis of stage IIB breast cancer last June. It was not caught early. Though Robin felt a lump a year before, when she scheduled a doctor’s appointment, the nurse couldn’t find anything. It took switching our insurance before a doctor diagnosed the cancer that was now in both breasts, including the tissue and the lymph nodes. It is treatable and her prognosis is good, but the cancer is not easily treatable. Our world stopped.

In July, Robin started six rounds of chemotherapy, one every three weeks. In the four weeks from diagnosis to the first round, she studied up extensively on her symptoms. Internet advice pointed to bone broth. Live on bone broth. I started boiling whole chickens, shredding the meat, making chicken and lemon soup, chicken noodle, chicken and rice, freezing them for when needed.

Struggling to Eat

And then came the first treatment. Almost immediately, the smell of meat made her nauseous. By the third day, she could not keep any of the bone broth down, nor could Robin handle any dairy, which induced stomach cramps. We began more research: citrus was a major trigger for nausea; no dairy; no meat; no wine or beer.

I kept trying to find alternatives. Robin’s esophagus was on fire; even romaine lettuce was too harsh going down. All fruit, including tomato, was too acidic. No spice. No coffee. Pasta is a comfort to me; it’s like breathing. But for Robin, pasta in olive oil was a big nope. It produced sharp pain in her side an hour after eating. We still do not know why.

Robin was 5’10” and 140 pounds when the chemotherapy began. She dropped 10 pounds by her second treatment. Steel-cut oatmeal and miso broth were all she could keep down. On a good day, she could have a banana with the oats. Splitting headaches started every morning as Robin had to refrain from drinking coffee and basic tea, which upset her stomach. The list of exclusions piled up and included butter. My heritage is Norwegian, so butter is its own food group. At first, I thought Robin was imagining things. I put some butter in the oatmeal. For 24 hours, she was convinced oatmeal caused her stomach pain, until I confessed.

Finding a Solution

Robin’s oncologist was confused: “Why are you going vegan? You need to eat.” But the doctor didn’t understand that this was not our choice. Before Robin’s third treatment, her nurse navigator spoke up: “Are you taking the nausea medications?” What nausea medications? They hadn’t given Robin the anti-nausea medications for concern about the side effects. But she had lost 15 pounds on her small frame, so we insisted on the medication.

Vietnamese ramen and Thai food might have saved her life, late summer. Ordering online was a challenge, because the delivery apps utilized by smaller restaurants don’t allow for customization and we needed to exclude citrus, meat, dairy, tomato, and spice. We struck gold when we realized that her system liked the plain homemade veggie burger at Alaro Craft Brewery, the restaurant where I work.

Somewhere around mid-September, things got a little bit better. The meds helped. Meat, dairy, citrus, and tomatoes were still a no-go, but soft vegetables fell back into favor and she could suddenly eat pasta again. Butter? Maybe, if not turned into a roux. Red wine also returned, thank God.

Turning the Corner

Keeping Robin alive through her food travails was top priority. She had lost about 30 pounds before turning a corner. She was so miserable that we could barely talk—really talk—for two months. We relate to each other around nice meals at restaurants, good wine at wineries. Where do we even go? How do we do this? Those months were hard. When our date nights returned, I scoped out the menu of a few restaurants, making two different reservations. A restaurant we like offered a simple roasted butternut squash risotto. We asked the server, “Can you just cook the risotto in butter without adding any cream?” We confessed to her chemotherapy challenges. The owner was very kind and bought us a round of drinks and my appetizer, but said he did not feel they could safely cook food for her. We left and found another restaurant with simple vegetables on the menu.

Saigon Alley, Alaro Craft Brewery, Hook & Ladder, Beast + Bounty, and The Coconut on T saved our mental health from September through Robin’s final full chemotherapy and double mastectomy at Christmas. As we talked, Robin’s grief and anger at the cancer came out. Why her? She is a healthy 43-year-old mother of two with no risk factors—she doesn’t smoke and she’s a healthy weight. About 15 years ago, we cut processed food out of our diets. Other than the occasional In-N-Out run, we don’t consume “bad” food.

Mostly Plant-Based

When chemotherapy ended, so did her nausea. Robin’s hair is not yet back, but her weight is returning. She is still on low-dose chemotherapy through 2024. I haven’t fully processed the last seven months. Is the cancer gone? We don’t know. No one knows. They have removed “everything they are aware of.” But what does that mean?

Robin is still on a mostly plant-based diet. She is rethinking everything we eat, going fully organic, confronting the pesticides in our fruits and vegetables. I support her. Food is a precious part of our relationship. I never gave it a second thought until it was gone. I’m not going vegetarian, but I am trying to embrace the Mediterranean diet of fresh fish, fruits and vegetables, and whole grains. I don’t know what our diet will be in the future. But I do know that I appreciate every reservation and every day that my wife can savor the flavor of a slow-cooked, well-loved meal.

Welcome Back

Robin is recovering. I made that realization on a recent Saturday, when our youngest child asked me to make my special tiramisu, loaded with coffee and cognac. Robin texted our daughter from our date to say, “Do not finish the tiramisu; the rest is mine for breakfast tomorrow.” Welcome back, Robin.