LWP - everything in your post sounds just fine. We were all freaked out at diagnosis too, so we will cut you some slack. As David said, you seem to be handling this pretty well, and better than some who have come before you.

As for neck dissection; I've heard that microscopic cancer can occur in the lymph nodes which may not be picked up on a CT scan. This is why they are considering dissection with a negative CT result. If they recommend dissection, flow with it, trust your doctors to know what they are doing.

A CCC is a comprehensive cancer center. All cancer centers are not CCC's. There are only about 20 CCC's in the U.S. but they are the absolute best in the country, the world renowned hospitals, with names like Mayo, Sloan-Kettering, MD Anderson. They have the best doctors and the most experience with each form of cancer. All that experience really does make a difference. I know Canada has some good cancer centers. Our Canadian members will point out who they are.

Did your doctor "stir the pot" when trying to remove the tumor before? Believe it or not, that is a fairly common phrase, even my RO said treatment (in your case surgery) made the tumor "angry".

You are still in the earliest phase of your learning curve about cancer. I expect everything you read that sounds bad, you are thinking oh I hope that doesn't happen to me, or what will I do if it does happen to me. In the beginning most new members think this way. The trick is to get beyond that, to get to where you can read all this stuff and learn from it as if it was happening to someone ELSE. My first week of reading was pretty freaky
too, but then it smoothed out after that. Most of that bad stuff didn't happen to me. My journey through treatment was pretty smooth.
Will your journey also be smooth, who knows, everyone is different (you will hear that over and over, ad nauseum). But, it's true, because we are all different. What happens to me may or may not happen to you.

I think one of the things that helped me most during my first month was getting on the forum and talking to other new members. We kind of reassured each other that we were not alone and that we would all get through this together.
None of us knew much about cancer, so we had to depend on the old-timer members for that, but it was comforting to have a group of people just like us to go through this journey with.

Discuss with your doctor the HPV-16 issue. If you have more surgery ask that the tumor tissue be sent to pathology for HPV examination. The doctor will probably do it anyway, as he will likely want to know. While HPV-16 is an STD, it being the cause of your cancer is a good thing because these cancers respond to treatment better and have higher survival rates.

Keep reading and asking questions, you're doing just fine. We are here with you every step of the way.

Tony