Thanks in advance to anyone kind enough to share their thoughts and experiences with me. I was originally diagnosed with stage 1 SCC to left side of tongue in Nov 2001 at age of 27. Had partial left glossectomy and neck disection on 12/17/01 with clean margins and no spread to nodes. Had a recurrence of cancer, have had 2 incidences of severe dysplasia over the years, ealy March 2006 and on 3/31/06 had surgery to remove a .5cm SCC tumor from same left side of tongue but this time a bit further back. I have recovered well from surgery. Margins this time were clean of invsaive cancer but thin, <1mm on deep side and on medial side of tumor "in situ carcinoma" was present at margin. Radiation has been recommended given margin situation and recurrence and I have obtained multiple opinions all leading to this recommendation. I will be starting radiation treatment in 2-3 weeks,got pushed back as I had all 4 impacted wisdom teeth removed yesterday. My first question is regarding appropriate focus of radiation. I have one radiation oncologist saying I need both sides radiated including neck nodes and another radiation oncologist saying treatment should only be on left side of my tongue where cancers have been and with no radiation to right side. Any thoughts on what is standard for someone with 2 stage 1 tumors, would could argue 2nd tumor isn't stage 1 given its a recurrence, both on same side of tongue? Would also love to hear how I can best prepare for radiation given I have 2-3 weeks. I plan to continue working as long as I can and am hoping to get the first or last appointment everyday. Can someone tell me if I would be better off first thing in morning or in the evening if planning to make most of remainder of my day? Is it unrealistic to think I can work through most of it? My research suggests I fall into the this newer breed of oral cancer patients who are younger with less history of smoking/drinking but who have persistent recurrences of tongue cancer. Hoping to find others on this messenge board in similar situation to me looking to talk further. I'm being told post radiation treatment I will continue to be followed-up aggressively but I don't want to give up on searching for potential treatments which will help avoid future transformaion of my cells. Any thoughts? Lastly, should I be exploring Erbitux as a possible treatment in conjunction with radiation? Multple surgeons have told me there is no clinical studies showing Erbitux to be beneficial to somone in my situation with stage 1/2 cancer of tongue but that could easily be because studies haven't been done yet.