Someone told me along time ago that bandsters can't eat "fibrous food" such as broccoli, sweet potatoes, and tomato skins. Is this true??? (and more importantly, can I have the blended broccoli cheese soup I am craving?)

Fibrous foods vs stringy foods are two totally different types. Fibrous foods like sweet potatos, broccoli, caluflower, cabbage, etc are not a problem if well chewed. Stringy foods, like celery, citrus fruits, mangos and things like that you have to be extremely careful with. I have found that I can eat them, carefully, but as you know everyone is different. I can't eat bread but others can for example. So you have to use your judgement. However if you are blending the soup in a blender, then I certainly see no harm as it will already be pulverized to the point of being easy to swallow and slide through the stoma.

Cindy

Yeah, what's the deal not eating the membranes on citrus fruits. Does that mean you can't eat oranges at all? That would suck.

You can eat citrus fruits, but you must be very careful of the membranes because they have a tendancy to get caught in the stoma and it takes a while before you can get them loose enough to completely go through. Realize those membranes, when you chew them, don't really break up a whole lot, they just kind of mush together, but they maintain their stringy quality. I know, tangerines are my favorite, I love them, but boy do I have to be super careful.

Cindy

I eat broccoli cheese soup without blending it, and have no problems. The cream of the soup helps it wash down. I do have problems with citrus fruit unless I seperate the membranes. Broccoli as a whole veggie is hard to get down for me too, even when I chew it to death.

You'll find for yourself through trial and error what you can and can't eat. If you eat something and it causes enough discomfort, you wont want to eat it again, and you wont miss it.

I don't miss cakes, breads or the like at all, and I was a big bread eater. I don't miss them because when I think about them I think about how uncomfortable I am after eating them, then I don't want them anymore.

I was thinking about oranges, I love oranges. If you quarter in the skin them rather than peel the whole thing and eat the segments, you can kind of suck all the juice and goodness out of it and still enjoy an orange without eating all the stringy bit and the pith.

One favourite meal of ours too is to roast up a heap of vegetables - eggplant, red capscicum, sweet potato, pumpkin and zucchini, with a drizzle of olive oil and some sea salt, chop them up in small bits and combine with some shredded chicken breast cooked in pesto and a sprinkle of cheese, roll them up in a pita bread and toast in the sandwich press, you can also combine the veges with pasta and pesto. Yummy. The bowl of vegetables, all the colours looks so absolutely delish but I realised the skins might cause me trouble, especially eggplant, that's very tough.

Sigh. I'll peel the little buggers if I have to. I'm not giving up good food like that.