Stephany,
My husband had 7 rounds of chemo...Cisplatin and Taxol and 41 rad treatments. He did not have a port...had just a little trouble because his veins were a little hard to find. We were told the same thing, that the chemo would help make the cancer cells more receptive to the rad treatments. Dan had the max radiation possible to tongue, throat, both sides of neck. His chemo wasn't too high a dose, therefore, it wasn't too bad and he didn't lose too much hair. It just made him very pale and weak. He had chemo/rad on Mondays...the chemo was about a 4 hour treatment. He was pretty good thru Wed. Thurs. and Fri. were definitely sleep days all the time. It got worse towards the end, but they had added two extra weeks of chemo/rad, so 8 weeks is a long treatment time. He is over two weeks out from treatment end and is just now starting to feel a little bit better. There was no improvement for two weeks and they told us that, but it was hard. He is feeling better now and a bit stronger. It just takes time. We have a wonderful support system and that has helped so much.

Your family is in my prayers!
Debbie