Caregiver to my aunt who is 100 yrs old, still able to get to the table to eat, otherwise, as expected sleeps a lot. She is 90% blind, only has aboutt 15% hearing in 1 ear WITH a hearing aid. There is not much she can do. We try to make meals as pleasant as possible, but this lady is so sweet she will never ever ASK for anything or tell you what she really likes. She also has several missing teeth-has trouble chewing, tends to spit out ANY larger pieces even tiny bits of chicken in crm of chk soup! but she can eat a chicken leg off the bone so part of this is in her mindset! Getting her to eat an adequate quantity is TOUGH. I constantly worry about this, try new things on her, but WAY more foods she doesn't like or simply WON'T eat than there are that she will. We've upped Ensure consumption to 4 a day to try and make up for part of it, but she is losing some weight and strength. Attitude is decent for 100 though, so I don't think she's given up. Eats if prompted but no real appetite
I ended up getting Junior's foods for mom and she enjoyed the taste of chicken and veg and mashed potatoes, etc. lasagna and meat sauce, a slew of choices.
Baby Probiotic Oatmeal in the am with fiber and protein powder.
Strawberry Kefir which she would drink right up.
Please know that Ensure is not a meal substitute and Personally I wouldn't go over one a day, but that's me.
bless you heart for taking care of this sweet lady. You are an angel.
lovbob
Good luck with your Mom.
I make the yogurts more usable by adding soluble fiber. Most sports drinks are tilted to be high protein/low calories and carbs. Work to find a mixture of these drinks or powders, yogurt (Trader Joe's tends to not have chemicals or HFCS), and other goodies like peanut butter. Mom has a preferred consistency. Now that summer is here, you can make icy drinks.
Oh, new discovery, is electrolyte-rich Coconut WATER (not milk or the syrup) taken from immature coconuts. It is often used by athletes to recover from muscle cramps and exhaustion. Probably good to help seniors stay hydrated. It's pricey, but I get the pure water,then mix with apple juice or into her yogurt.
A couple of years ago I was thinking, "What would cream of asparagus be like?", which caused me to look up creamed vegetable soups in general. So now I make them all the time, with asparagus, brocolli, artichoke, onion, potato, squash, etc. Various seasonings, of course , with sometimes a little sour cream, and finished off to perfect smoothness with an immersion blender.
If you believe in getting vitamins and minerals from food, this is definitely a great way to go. And pureed food has got to be the easiest for that age group to digest.
Digestive enzymes come in handy also.