Healthy Diet

[JessN12]

HI All,

Mum who has Alzheimer's has had some blood tests after we took her to the docs for increased confusion and its show she has low Vitamin B12 and Folate.

Since dad has started cooking for them both the diet has gone downhill, no veg just meat and potato and ready meals. I have tried to offer to order them nice better qulaity meals, batch cook for them, set up meals on wheels once a week to improve thier diet but dad won;t have any of it! Its literally making mum more ill and I don't know how to persuade him.

Also the trouble is now Mum says she doesn't like vegetables and has developed an enormous sweet tooth so I imagine its a lot easier for Dad to feed her very basic food to save an argument.

Any tips on improving diet?

 

[Blissy]

Would they drink a cup of homemade soup with their lunch or dinner. You could pack them with vegetables. I do this to increase our vegetable consumption. So easy just stock cube, onion, veg of choice and water all given a blitz when cooked.

 

[Kevinl]

Multi vitamin and mineral supplements, can't recommend a brand but the tablets are in most supermarkets, many provide 100% of the vitamins but read the label as you mention specific deficiencies.
B12 is the sunshine vitamin isn't folate also known as folic acid, if I remember right.
Health food shops usually have most things, supermarket products are often the same thing. K

 

[canary]

Its often really difficult to get people with dementia to eat a healthy diet - especially once they develop the dementia sweet tooth.

I expect your mum complains quite vociferously to your dad about eating vegetables and he is going for a quiet life (and actually I dont blame him!) with what he is cooking.

Yes, try "hiding" them in things like soup, or give multi vitamins
Little tip - if you are hiding vegetables and the the food becomes a suspicious green colour, add a squeeze of tomato paste which will turn it an inoffensive brown

 

[Lawson58]

Sometimes people cannot absorb Vitamin B through the usual digestive processes but a person can have injections about every two months but I may be wrong about that. Low Vitamin B can cause symptoms that are very much like dementia with some memory issues and confusion.

 

[2ndAlto]

Sometimes people cannot absorb Vitamin B through the usual digestive processes but a person can have injections about every two months but I may be wrong about that. Low Vitamin B can cause symptoms that are very much like dementia with some memory issues and confusion.

Absolutely right @Lawson58. You can also get Vit B12 tablets. I don't think it is the sunshine vitamin Kevin - that'd be Vit D. Prob a multi vitamin would help if your Mum would take it @JessN12 - what did the doctor recommend?

 

[Jessie5]

What about some stewed fruit for pudding? I use bags of frozen berries with a bit of sugar. Or stick a crumble topping on with oats etc. You could take it round as a treat? I know won’t solve the problem but might give a bit of a vitamin boost!

Also used to take things like cottage pies in with lots of hidden veg (frozen spinach, carrots, celery, onions etc) and not take no for an answer. ‘I was making for myself. Made too much. Don’t want it to go to waste etc. ‘

 

[2ndAlto]

Vitamin B12 in fish, meat, poultry, eggs, milk and other dairy products.

 

[Jessbow]

Lcking vitamin Vitamin b12 is basically anaemic
Foliate is part of vitamin B- the bit that makes good red blood cells

Id say anaemia is common in may elderly people, iron tablet may help- can cause constipation though

Not many people eat enough green leaf veg to make up for an iron deficiency

 

[Collywobbles]

Seems pretty standard for folks to reject veggies and crave sweet things. Dementia affects the sense of taste. My Mum complains that all vegetables taste bitter and disgusting. Apparently the sweet receptors are the last to be affected, giving rise to a common craving for sweet things.

The trick with my Mum is to focus on ripe fruit. She particularly loves raspberries and will always eat them - although admittedly they do need to be sprinkled with sugar sometimes.

My Dad is also very stubborn about insisting on still cooking for both of them, but at least has decided on a range of quality freezer meals, where all the ingredients are recognisable.

 

[nitram]

Several breakfast cereals are a good source of vitamins
eg scroll down https://groceries.asda.com/product/bran-flakes-fruit-n-fibre/asda-high-bran/1000116563968