For me, the area became a lot more swollen and because of that more painful. I let it go on too long because I was pregnant and thought it was just due to stress on my body. By the time my daughter was three months old, it had swollen too big to ignore and it was painful to talk or eat because it rubbed on my teeth. I still wasn't able to distinguish it from scar tissue and did not expect the cancer diagnosis. I think it's best to follow the guideline of having any sore checked out that doesn't heal after two weeks. That way if anything ever does progress to cancer, you can catch it right away. I very much regret waiting as it gave the cancer a chance to spread to my lymph nodes.