thank you all for the kind words, i am also glad i found this sight when i did. i am being seen by dr. padhya at moffitt cancer center in tampa, fl.i was lucky as we live in the area and cn be seen easily. i met with almost everyone on the team pain management, psychiatrist, radiation dr and of course the surgeon. i wi;ll be having a r posterior glossectomy with a r neck dissection and possibly skin grafts/flaps to close the tongue incision. will probably have a feeding tube(dobhoff) to go home with if they do the grafts as they won't want the tongue to move for about a week. surgery should take 2-3 hours and a 2-3 day hospital stay. my surgery is scheduled for 12 noon on thursday,tomorrow and we are going out tonite for all you can eat seafood dinners. my 2 sisters are coming down from tallahassee, they are both nurses as am i. what i really want to know more about is the post op period can you eat,swallow,talk how long should i plan on being out of commission things of that sort and also what the caregiver shopuld expect with all of this. thank you all so much for youirs posts i really appreciate it. oh yeah and what about teeth i have heard that they have to be removed in some cases. my shoe size is 7 1/2!!!