I really hope you are right about the aprehensiveness...Gosh I feel so much like I am on unchartered waters yet I know there are those who have travelled them before. Still we forge ahead day by day hoping that it was nothing or we didn't miss a turn. Today is much better and I think I do over react for the most part but when it comes to cancer I can there be an over reaction? It's just I can't believe how crappy I felt yesterday...now today with a bit of getting out and moving around things seem to be less still a small pressure but not real noticable only when I concentrate on it can I feel it...So it is like that old saying if a tree falls in the woods does it make a noise. If I have to concentrate on a pain or a pressure to feel it is it really there...hmmm I wonder...so for today I will just continue on and the best I can do is monitor write down and ask when I talk to a professional.

My ENT told me "YOU are the expert on you!"

That is a great great relationship...I keep teasing my doctor I am two weeks shy of graduating and being a doctor..He just laughs we are really not that close...

But yours is a good relationship...

The human body is wierd indeed. Amazing machine all on it's own. I guess issues for me always happen on a weekend or holiday. I must have been having a really bad day the other day for the pain to be as bad as it was. Today seems a lot better still my ear is not painful but it grabs my attention once in a while when my mind is idle...lol...I am still not ruling out an infection though...so I will contact my nurse and check things out if I still have this after my physio tomorrow...Thanks everyone for your support...but infection or fluid from the removed nodes sounds like pretty reasonable answers...but only the doctor would know that

It's hard not to over react when it's your own body- especially when, in the early post Tx, we're all waiting for the other shoe to drop. I started noticing parts of my anatomy, like the salivary glands alongside the cheeks and thought they were a new tumor. My H&N surgeon and I had a good laugh over that one (after the fact of course).

I had to take prednisone only a few months ago for a fluid buildup that just wouldn't go away. ENT's can easily see this with a simple otoscope exam. Sometime the swelling jams up the eustacian tubes and an anti-inflammatory, like prednisone, is the ticket to reduce the swelling so they can start draining normally again. Antibiotics don't work in these cases.

If your eardrum does rupture you will know it. First, the pain will stop abruptly and your ear will drain blood and pus for a while. You want to avoid this as ruptured eardrums will decrease your mid range hearing sensitivity. This is good enough reason to get a faster appointment with your ENT.