Overcoming The Garcia Effect

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

First of all, asking for a friend, so it isn’t just academic, and yes, he is under a doctor’s care, but he’s looking for outside ideas, his doctor knows he is, and will run anything radical past his doctor first.

The Garcia Effect is a specific type of food aversion that happens when a person vomits, then develops a strong aversion to the most recent food eaten, whether or not it caused the stomach upset.

I experienced it once when I had pizza from a place called “Garcia’s Flying Tomatoes,” which is why I’ve never forgotten the name of the phenomenon. I had caught a virus from my cousins several days earlier, and we were all sick-- I just happened to have eaten the pizza most recently before the puking set it, and developed a powerful aversion to the pizza-- I couldn’t even walk past the place and smell it.

Faded after about 5 years.

So, my friend was a cancer patient, and is 6 years cancer-free; for his type of cancer, 5 years is “cured,” because at that point the odds of a recurrence are the same as a new cancer in someone who never had it. When he had chemo, he was puking a lot, but did have a lot of strong antiemetics prescribed, and came out of it still able to eat a reasonable variety of foods.

But then he caught the delta variation of COVID, and was horribly sick. He was averse to almost everything. There were a few fruits he could eat, and could drink Vanilla Boost with a little half & half in it, which probably saved his life, even though he had just one or two a day, along with one banana, and sometimes a piece of toast. I was there-- not making that up.

He lost about 40 lbs.

Once the COVID was gone, his weight came back up, but a lot of the food aversions never left. He tries taking bites of things, and literally gags, like it was stuck in his throat, but it was a small bite.

Aversions are better or worst some days, but are always there. There are a few foods he calls “safe,” in that they have never provoked a reaction, and other foods that he never can eat, and a large group of foods that he used to like, and sometimes can eat fine, but other days provoke a reaction.

Greek yogurt is fortunately a safe food, so that’s how he is getting protein, and he takes vitamins.

He has tried pot to reduce aversions, and it works in that about 50% of the “sometimes” foods become easy to eat. But he can’t go to work high, especially since it’s not legal here, even medicinally.

My friend’s doctor put him on steroids to increase his appetite, but since appetite was not actually the problem, he was just ravenously hungry, with nothing to eat.

So, my question:

Anyone here overcome food aversions caused by cancer, or an illness like COVID? What did you do to overcome them?

Overcome food aversions from some other cause?

My friend is looking for a lot of strategies he can try. His BMI is very low, and his doctor says if he loses 2 more percentage points, he will recommend a feeding tube.

He says he will move to another state where pot is legal, if it gets to that. But he’d rather have a non-tube solution that lets him stay here.

2

Ten years ago we collected a large number of a specific mushroom. We had a positive ID, I made a spore print and the species had no look look alikes that were toxic. Even with a definitive ID it is recommended that your first experience with a new mushroom be a small amount because there are idiosyncratic allergy-type things that can happen.

We, however, ate a huge meal of the collected mushrooms. The meal was delicious. My gf was fine. At some point overnight I felt ill, so I got up and began a near constant stream of vomiting and diarrhea which then led to muscle cramps. From 11 pm until 5 am I was sick nonstop. My gf slept through my problems, as I went out of my way to allow her to sleep.

At one point I realized I might be dying. During a lull in my toilet use I decided I needed an ambulance. I got some clothes together but when I tried to lift my leg to dress, I collapsed and passed out.

The next morning my gf found me. I was on the floor in the fetal position, weak but alive. She helped me get up and I went to bed. I spoke with a mycologist and learned where I’d made my mistake.

It took about a year before I could even think about eating a mushroom without feeling immediately ill. I read about the Garcia Effect and tried to rationally understand why this was. Now I eat mushrooms of any variety other than the one that nearly killed me.

3

Before medical cannabis was legal In Pennsylvania, a friend’s father’s oncologist recommended cannabis for his cancer chemo side effects. My friend approached me and I got his dad a bag.

I taught him how to smoke it and gave him an old pipe of mine. It helped him immensely, making his final months of life enjoyable. He actually put on some weight.

When my friend told me his dad had run out, I brought over some more. His dad apologized for using it so fast, he thought he was addicted. I explained to him that in the time he used up the half ounce I’d given him, I’d used more than he had and I was just enjoying the plant recreationally.

4

What an odd coincidence!

I don’t have any personal anecdotes about overcoming the Garcia effect. I’ve gotten violently ill after consuming a specific thing twice in my life-- once from too much rum as a teenager. i think I avoided rum and most alcohol after that for awhile, which was for the best. But rum is now one of my favorite liquors when I enjoy a mixed drink. The other time was when I came down with a powerful stomach virus the night after having ceviche for dinner. I was sick as a dog for days, but there was a definite virus that had been going through family members, so I knew it wasn’t the ceviche. And though I didn’t actively seek out ceviche after that, I don’t think I developed a ‘Garcia Effect’ style avoidance.

As for your friend, all I can think of is ‘exposure therapy’ which is effective as part of Cognitive Behavioral Therapy for people with OCD (which runs in my family). A thing the OCD sufferer has an irrational fear of is gradually introduced to them-- first they may just be asked to imagine it, then the actual thing is introduced gradually until the person is habituated to it. An irrational fear is not exactly the same as a Garcia-style avoidance, but they are both psychological, so maybe it would be similarly effective. Your friend might first imagine a food item they have aversion to. Then just smell it. Then maybe imagine a time when they ate the food with enjoyment. And so on until the aversion is gone.

What a harrowing story. So what exactly was your mistake, since your GF ate the same mushrooms and was fine? Was it this (emphasis mine):

5

The first time trying a new mushroom, take a bite and wait a few hours. Don’t consume a huge amount like I did.

6

I used to collect wild mushrooms a lot. The standard advice is that there are only a few fungi that can kill you, but a lot which can just make you wish you were dead for a while, usually because your digestive system strongly objects. Every fungus is an entirely different species. Yes, for every new species, only a nibble, even if you’ve definitively keyed it out.

7

What kind of cuisine was he eating while going through his illness? I would suggest trying out a new type of cuisine with a completely different flavor palate.

8

Huh. I had no idea that mushrooms generally classified as safe to eat could cause such an extreme allergic reaction in some people.

Years ago a guy I worked with retired early to live off the land with his girlfriend on a couple hundred acre plot in the wilderness of Michigan’s U.P. I went up with a friend to pay a visit. They served us a mushroom lasagna made with wild-picked mushrooms. I asked, with a jokey manner to not offend, but was not really joking: “no offense, but you guys know what you’re doing with mushroom ID, right?” They assured us that they did know what they were doing, so I took them at their word, and we ate good-sized portions. Gave no thought to possible allergic reactions. We were fine afterward.

When I started finding morel mushrooms in my own backyard, I was super-duper cautious at first. Despite the fact that morels are one of the easiest fungal species to ID (there are poisonous false morels, but they are easy to ID by a fibrous interior-- true morels are hollow inside and look like a rubber mold when cut in half). Although I was confident in my ID, and I had eaten morels in restaurants before, the fear of eating a wild thing I had picked myself was difficult to overcome-- I tried little nibbles at first.

But it wasn’t too long before I was making backyard-picked morel mushroom risotto :yum:

9

A friend found some mushrooms that I confirmed were Coprinus species. Totally safe to eat, so long as you do not drink alcohol with the meal or for a few days after.

He ate them and was fine, but went out the following evening and drank wine. Sick as a dog. He thought I was exaggerating. Coprinus species contain varying amounts of the chemical Coprine, which is responsible for this effect.

One common name for the mushroom is Tippler’s Bane.

10

I had heard of that. Fungi are such a fascinating and complex life form-- neither plant nor animal. Most perfectly safe to eat, many downright delicious, yet some deadly poisonous. And, I’ve heard, some varieties that are deadly poison actually are also very tasty. You’d think they’d be awful-tasting, but no.

And then, of course, there are the psychoactive varieties :crazy_face:

11

The very best varieties.

I once got violently ill from seasickness. The last things I had consumed were some prosciutto and melon and cognac. It probably took 10-15 years before I could eat prosciutto again. I still have not had cognac since then, and at this point it has been at least 30 years.

After I had a bout of diverticulitis I was afraid to eat. The idea that pretty much anything was going to cause me internal distress made eating very difficult. Boost and Ensure provided the majority of my calories on some days. Then I found that I could eat chicken breast and white rice with teriyaki sauce with no issues. I ate that for months before I felt comfortable adding back other foods.

I never knew that there was a name for that until today. I was lucky only 2 things bothered me and they were easily avoided (from the seasickness issue) and I was able to find things I could eat (diverticulitis). Would BRAT or CRAM be an option?

12

When I was eight, I was sick. My mother insisted I eat some tomato soup. I warned her that if I ate any, I’d throw up. She was having none of it. I had no choice. So I started eating it, and immediately threw up on the floor. I think it was more like 15 years before I could eat tomato soup again.

13

My Garcia Effect came from anesthetics used to put me under and support my blood pressure during a relatively minor procedure about 9 months ago.

When I awoke, I was ravenous, but had an incredibly dry mouth, even worse than the typical ‘atropine mouth’ I was familiar with. I was also ravenously hungry, having had to fast for nearly 24 hours by that point.

They gave me juice and a few crackers. Juice was good, but the crackers were too dry. On the way home, I made the Mrs. drive thru Taco Bell so I could grab a nice 5 layer beef roll-up and some nacho fries.

Well, that all tasted like dry desert dust, stuck in my throat, caused gagging and upchucking of the little that I’d been able to downchuck in the first place.

Haven’t been to Taco Bell ever since, even tho prior to that it’d been one of my great guilty pleasures. I feel no urge to return, and have had none of the cravings or longings for their “cuisine” since.

14

Is your friend struggling due to the flavor or the texture of certain foods? Or is it just the knowledge that chicken, in any form, is included in a particular meal and he just can’t stand the thought of eating it? And I second the suggestion of trying a different type of cuisine - it might be able to “trick” him by tasting so different.

Due to COVID, I lost my sense of taste for a month and struggled with a warped sense of taste for months after. Texture became incredibly important. Anything soft or mushy was gag-inducing. I struggled with things like sandwiches unless I could add texture - so I had to put potato chips on them to give it a crunch. If texture is one of his triggers, it might be worth trying to play around to find out what he can add to change it up enough to be more palatable.

15

My Garcia effect aversion is to Pepto-Bismol, for obvious reasons. I’ve not bothered to check to see if I’ve overcome it or not.

16

Has he tried counseling/psychiatry? That is what this sounds like to me, not something physiological.

17

I had no idea this effect has a name. I started a thread based on my own experience a few years back. I was made extremely ill by azathioprine, and developed an aversion to a number of the foods (fortunately a small number) that I was eating at the time.

In my case, the passage of time has resolved the problem, apart from ginger - the thought of crystallized ginger still makes me queasy after more than 10 years. Here’s what I posted at the time:

…Or for that matter, foods that you couldn’t face for a prolonged period? In which latter category I offer: Marmalade. Just in case it’s a bit too culturally specific for everyone, here’s the wiki - it’s a kind of jam/jello usually made from bitter oranges, and today I ate some for the first time in seven years or so. And I really enjoyed it.

Seven years ago I was put on azathioprine for UC. It may make you feel a little nauseous, said the doctor, but stick with it. Well, the effects kicked in over the weekend so I couldn’t get to the GP for anti-emetics. I bought some crystallised ginger because it has a mild anti-emetic effect: no use at all. Even when I did get a script for metoclopramide, that had no discernible effect either. I’ll spare you a description of my state at that time, but I was not good at all; they took me off azathioprine after a couple of awful weeks. Failed.

One of the odder effects of this episode was that the things I was eating at that time became repulsive to me. Over the years, most of these I have been able to enjoy again; and today, after seven years, I saw Mrs Trep’s jar of marmalade in the fridge and I thought: you know what…….and I ate some, and it was good.

Mind you, even the smell of sweet ginger still makes me retch.

As it was only a few foods for me, it was a simple thing to just avoid them until the revulsion passed. I wish your friend well, and hope that things will get easier for him with time.

j

18

I didn’t realise this phenomenon had a name.
I used to love bivalve shellfish - mussels, clams, etc. One time on holiday in Cornwall, we went to a beach where the rocks were completely encrusted with lovely mussels. I gathered a load - I’ve done it many times before.
Back at the holiday cottage I carefully prepared the mussels and made Moules marinière again, done it many times - no uncertainty.

In the middle of the night I was awakened by severe abdominal cramps and I went to the bathroom where I spent most of the night manifesting the outward symptoms of a severe gastric upset.
I was the only one who ate the mussels. I was the only one who got sick. Obviously it must have been the mussels - so we all assumed.
Until the next night my wife and daughter came down with similar symptoms and the following morning, so did my son-in-law.

Turns out it was some infectious gastric bug - norovirus or similar.

Except I couldn’t face the idea of eating mussels or similar seafood any more. That was what had come back up when I was sick. That’s what my body had learned, was the enemy.

That was 8 years ago and for most of that time, I just couldn’t face the idea of eating mussels or indeed any bivalves, even though I remembered really enjoying them.
In the past few years I have tentatively tried getting over it. I can eat scallops now, probably just because they are just like a lovely little nugget of delicious white meat. I did try a few mussels and clams in a wok restaurant and I was OK with them. Not sure I will ever love them as once I did.

Advice if any…

  • Give it time
  • Try just a little bit
  • Use distractions (the mussels I tried most recently were cooked with hot chillies)
  • Don’t overthink it - this has to be the hardest part - when you do try a little bit, you kind of need to NOT be thinking about the problem, and NOT thinking intently about the item you’re eating.
19

Just a follow-up:

He didn’t exactly do this, but he checked out the spice aisle, and sniffed a few things he didn’t happen to use when he cooked, and picked a few that smelled good, and has developed some new recipes he likes (he’s an amateur chef and baker, another reason this has been a real blow), that are old things, but with alterations in the way they are seasoned.

That has worked for several things, and although he eats meat, he only does a couple of times a week, and makes lots of vegetarian dishes, so I have tasted some of his new stuff, and it’s good.