Thank you all for your candor,and prompt and honest answers. Cathy, congratulations on 16 years free! That gives us all hope! All 3 of you do! I think my husband's cancer must have been Stage I / II with T-2. I have done a lot of reading about oral cancer and treatment, and my question is, if they "aim" at the cancer during radiation, but there are no signs of it, WHAT do they aim at, and how do they prevent damaging non-cancerous tissue? Cathy, when you said the effects of radiation were just "temporary", does that include damage to saliva glands and did those return to producing saliva? How do they determine how MUCH radiation is ENOUGH? 4 weeks? 6 weeks? etc. Gary, I asked the doctor's associate right after his surgery, if it was considered a metastesis or a new, primary tumor, but she said "neither...it is considered a recurrence". Do any of you have saliva glands that no longer function; radiation damage to your teeth or jawbones? Also, why don't they do radiation right away and skip surgery? We are going to work with Mayo Clinic in Rochester. And Barb, thanks for your prayers and ours are with you also - please keep me informed on your POSITIVE progress! Again, thanks to all of you for helping me see this from the experience of others. HUGS! Jane