Monday, November 24, 2014

How to survive Thanksgiving week when you’re a pediatric cancer patient

Everyone knows that Thanksgiving is a stressful time of year. It’s seems to be a holiday that lasts all day long and there is not a whole lot to occupy your time other than cooking or watching football. For many families its a time spent around your extended family. Meaning that there will be a lot of people are around as well- making it possible for heated discussion or argument. Teen with a Dream sat down to think of some tips help you get through Thanksgiving and with only a couple days to go you’ll have plenty of time to practice. 

Tip 1: It is a holiday after all, and if your on treatment you may not feel like a celebration, but make sure you celebrate the small things on Thanksgiving, if your blood counts are holding steady celebrate, if you’ve gone 3 days without throwing up…celebrate it!! 

Tip 2: Avoid eating food that you want to enjoy in the future. If you love pumpkin pie and eat it at the height of treatment, the chances of you wanting or liking pumpkin pie in the future are pretty low. A sad but very true side effect of chemo. 

Tip 3: Enjoy the natural effect of Tryptophan, this is what is naturally found in Turkey that makes you sleepy so eat a lot and rest up- you need your strength. 

Tip 4: Play small games, games help keep our minds occupied and also everyone else in the room as well.

Tip 5: Avoid heated debates, they take a lot out of you and can turn a dinner into a battle ground- one of the top suggested topics for this Thanksgiving is the new Hunger Games movie. There are so many of them that there is bound to be something everyone can talk about. 

Tip 6: Get a organic or steroid and hormone free turkey. I know organic makes it seem like it is fancy but the truth is, during treatment you don’t need all the other stuff they normally use to make turkeys larger in your body. Natural is the way to go!

No comments:

Post a Comment