Hi Garrett and welcome, I have had about 70% of my tongue removed. At week three I could never have swallowed. When I finally passed the swallow test, I started use to use my blender and blended things like chilli,soup,raviolies/sauce, potatoes and gravy and then just kinda drank that. Then slowly I would take things like a tindy piece of ravioli and a bunch of sauce and kind of move that around till it went down. That went on for a couple weeks and then my dad started taking me to "Old Country Buffet". The key here is the "Buffett". It was there that I really was able to experimant and practice eating all sorts of things. I generally would eat everything ia a sauce or something so it would slip right down my throat. It got prggessivly better after that. I still have some difficulty's with things that are to dry or need alot of chewing as it is still difficult to move food around too much. I mean I still use my finger every day to dig stuff out of the roof of my mouth. It sounds like if the back of your tongue can lift that will be a big help in swallowing. I also think the have some devices you put in your mouth that can give you more control also. Sorry but I can't remember the name.