My husband has mild to moderate cognitive decline, also RA (joint pain), COPD and is getting pretty frail. He is still able to walk and care for his personal hygiene. He still smokes a couple cigarettes a day.
His appetite has been diminishing over the past few months and over the past couple days, refuses to eat much of anything, lucky to get 500 calories some days and very little protein. I've noticed when he would use medical cannabis for his RA pain, his appetite would improve some but it was really blasting his brain - balance, memory, etc. really plunging him into major memory deficit, so I have backed off letting him have any for fear it would speed his mental decline.
I don't want to see him starve himself while under my care. I have made his favorite foods, he'll take 2 bites then "I'm not hungry anymore." He is sleeping a lot more - of course, no energy intake. Sigh.
I am going to run this by his doctor, but right now am looking for practical solutions or ideas any of you in this forum might have come up with when facing similar. Thank you.
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I will look more into CBD, and find some MJ that isn't as strong. Also will read up on Megace and Marinol.
Lo and behold....He ate pretty well today, we just had dinner and he had probably 3 oz. fried pork strips (breading, olive oil, butter) that I made and fried potatoes-big serving. He said it was yummy and he'd eat leftovers tomorrow. Hope he remembers.
Tomorrow I will make some cookies and make sure he doesn't load up and spoil his supper, lol. Kind of like having a kid again. I am sounding more and more like my mom all the time.
Thanks again!
Thanks again!
CBD, by contrast, does not cause the munchies, the experts said. But it may boost appetite in a different way if it's added to foods and beverages or taken as a medication. “CBD helps relieve nausea and can calm your nervous system and digestive tract,” Bissex says. “If you feel less nauseated, you may eat more.
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Is it possible to offer tiny portions of food spread out over the day? Does he like chips? Pork rinds (talk about calories), butter cookies? Offer this while he's watching a favorite show or sports, mindless eating also worked for my mom, she could put away a fair amount of Cheeze-its while watching a movie.
Try to reduce the cigs even more, nicotine kills the appetite.
I wonder if you reduced his medical mj instead of eliminating it, if that would be enough to help his appetite and his RA without making him too loopy. Sounds like maybe he was having a little too much.
Could be he's also turning a corner and getting a bit worse in the dementia department. All you can do is offer food. And drinks.
Good luck.