Clint,

If you DO get a seond opinion and they recommend surgery as well, I'm here to tell you that I understand your quality of lifem concerns. BUT, as an ENT I went to when I realized my dysphagia might not go away said to me"there's nothing that interferes with quality of life quite like death"

Also, when I had my partial glossectomy my ENT gave me dire warnings about what this could do to my speech and my speech is fine. I do have swallowing problems but they are more from the effects of radiation than the effects of my surgery. They have to warn you about the worst things but they don't always happen.

I think you mentioned you are a psychologist, right? I'm sure thinking about losing your ability to speak clearly includes thinking about losing your ability to do your job--it did for me too (I was trained as an experimental pscyhologist and teach psychology).

But I don't know if you keep up with all the research on life satisfaction and affective forecasting -- it turns out that we're pretty bad at predicting future happiness under these conditions. Everyone thinks they'd be miserable with a disability they don't have now and most people (MOST) go back to their normal level of life satisfaction fairly rapidly.

My inability to swallow does affect my life satisfaction soemtimes--when people are talking about a great new restaurant or my husband makes my favorite kind of pizza. But you'd be amazed how seldom these moments are and how much else there is in the world to make me happy.

Just a little perspective for you....

Nelie