Barbara,

I know it can be scary to read about some of the experiences of people who have dealt with this, but remember that some of what you're seeing is from people who were Stage III or IV diagnoses and had exceptionally tough times with treatment. As you keep reading on this forum, you can see that there is a pretty wide range of experiences.

I was a Stage II -- had surgery first (was out of work for a couple of weeks to recover from surgery) and then, a couple of weeks after that, started radiation. Back then, radiation was less targeted than it tends to be now, so it was general field radiation from my cheekbones down to below my collarbones. While eating and swallowing were extremely painful for weeks, I was still able to continue working part time (about 5-6 hours a day) and drive back and forth to radiation. My radiation oncologist had told me I would lose weight and I was determined to prove him wrong. Since I'm the cook in the house, I kept experimenting with anything I could think of in the category of soft/semi-liquid foods to keep at a targeted calorie level. While none of it tasted good, the objective was to get it to slide down easily and provide nourishment. I had to use numbing agents in my mouth for several months to minimize the pain of eating and drinking, but was able to keep the weight loss to around 10-12 pounds.

It does take months for taste buds to come back, and dry mouth can be a problem (although I've gotten back a surprising amount of salivary function), but once I got past the first few months after treatment, my quality of life got back to the point where I have NO complaints.

Cathy