Hello. My name is Melissa. I am 44 years old and was diagnosed in Jan. with Oral Tongue Cancer (invasive squamous cell - moderately differentiated). I had a sore on the side of my tongue which looked like a canker sore and didn't go away. One thing led to another and an Ear, Nose and Throat doctor biopsied it in early January and it came back malignant. The tumor was small - around 0.6 cm.

Next I had a wide excision done on the rest of the lesion on the tongue. The ENT (also a head and neck surgean) and oncologist were not entirely happy with the margin on one part of this surgery, so I had another wide excision done on the tongue two weeks later along with a modified neck dissection to check for micrometastisis to the lymph nodes (everything was done on the right side).

Before all of you wonder why a Stage 1 tumor warranted a neck dissection this is not my first encounter, so to speak, with cancer. In 1994 I was diagnosed with a very aggressive breast cancer that had metastisized to 18 lymph nodes under my right arm while I was pregnant with my son. I was a candidate for very aggresive treatment and had a double stem-cell transplant with high dosage chemotherapy, radiation and mastectomy with reconstruction at the City of Hope in a clinical trial.

I am one of those super success stories that beat the odds the first time. I even went on to have a little girl seven years after treatment!!

After discussing the pros and cons of the neck surgery to look for metastisis I opted to be very aggresive like I was the first time I had cancer. I am very lucky in that the nodes (10 in all) were all enlarged but all came back negative for metastisis.

I never smoked and am an unusual person to get oral cancer. My oncologist has seen former transplant patients go on to develop oral squamous cell cancers down the road. The thinking in my case is that my immune system is altered from all the previous treatments and my mouth environment (without realizing it) was not functioning as well as it should - lower saliva and higher bacteria, etc. The City of Hope has conferred with my doctors so far on treatment and I am scheduled to see them with all my pathology and surgical reports to follow up and discuss monitoring my situation.

I have read some of the discussions and forums. I am keeping all of you in my thoughts and prayers as you progress through treatments. I'm lucky this time so far, but believe me when I had high-dosage chemo at City of Hope and was in isolation and on morphine I can relate to all the difficult situations some of you are in right now.

I havn't discussed yet with the doctors (too busy just getting through the surgeries) about how to best take care of my mouth and neck for the future. For instance, I heard someplace not to drink alcohol. My one doctor said moderation is o.k. Any helpful hints, thoughts, information along these lines? Thank you everyone - hang in there and get through one day at a time!!