John - I can echo your sentiment about meeting wonderful people - my experience is like yours. Perhaps it is the reality of cancer that sweeps away pretentiousness, and gets us down to the real us. Whatever it is, it sure feels good.

The food thing is a long term concern for me. All my teeth were pulled before rad. The ray gun pretty much killed my swallow, so I am still living by my peg tube - over two years out of tx. Getting dentures to fit well has been a challenge. The radiation is so hard on the jaw tissues that we cannot risk even minor abrasions in there - little injuries can become huge ones in a hurry.

The overall healing is slow, but it does continue and its a thrill to get the tiniest pieces of function back. Food may never be as it was before, but it is exciting to find new things to swallow! Keep those clean PET scans coming. They beat pizza any time. Tom