Hello everyone. First let me say I feel a bit guilty posting here after seeing all you people deal with actual cancer when I myself am just showing strange symptoms. Let me start at the beginning.

I am a 21 year old college student and it is exactly one year to the day I noticed my tongue was painful and inflamed. When I took a look in the mirror I noticed three white spots on various locations of my tongue. This scared me, but I decided to wait, hoping the pain and the spots would go away. Of course, they didn't, and only grew until, before I knew it, the entire surface area of my tongue was covered in the rough white patches. Not only that, but a sore began to develop on the left side of my tongue. This was the final straw and I finally went into an oral surgeon who told me it was probably nothing to worry about, but took a biopsy. The diagnosis was lichen planus and I was relieved, as I was sure it was cancer. I began treatment with steroids which did absolutely nothing. I went to an ENT for a second opinion (3 other ENTs shrugged me off because of my age, btw. They wouldn't even look in my mouth!) He gave me a second biopsy, and this time the diagnosis was chronic inflammation, no lichen planus. This worries me, as the spot on my tongue is still very sore and sensitive. On top of that, I began to develop an earache in the left ear which steadily grew in intensity. Soon after, pain in my throat on the left side developed as well. This was another last straw and I requested a CT scan of the neck. I got the results back and they were stated to be 'unremarkable'. This is the position I'm in now, after eight months of searching for an answer. I told myself the CT was it; if nothing showed up, then there was nothing wrong. I am a college student and I can barely afford doing this. But I still can't shake the feeling that something IS wrong, especially with the somewhat intense pain in my ear and throat for the past nine months. Pain is supposed to tell us that something's wrong, right? What do you guys think? Have any of you had experience with this type of stuff? What more can I do?

Thanks in advance!

-Colton