I have an update on my body's impressive ability to build grand new structures of scar tissue on the inside of my mouth....

While my surgeon said he didn't think there would be a problem with DOING the surgery- he thinks he'll be able to do the skin graft even with the irradiated tissue - I've since been told by the speech therapist that the surgery won't exactly be a cakewalk in terms of eating post surgery. She said that the last patient that he did a scar revision on wasn't able to eat anything other than liquids for about 4 weeks after the surgery - and I'm not in a place nutritionally where I can afford to go even one day without eating as I've been struggling to stay above the 18.5 number on the BMI index (18.5 indicates that you are underweight!). So - that was frustrating enough of a thought!

Well - last night while doing my weekly very thorough inspection of my oral cavity with a pen light - I noticed that I have a new scar band developing on the right side of my mouth! This one is tethering my tongue to my right tonsil. No wonder I've been feeling discomfort and stretching on that side of my mouth - I was attributing the sensations to overdoing my speech therapy exercises. UGH! How annoying! The thing that really worries me about these scar tissue growths is that the back of my throat opening is getting more and more narrow as the growths develop - and I already am dealing with dysphagia from a base of tongue weakness - and I am also concerned that my my tongue will become even more restricted with the new tethers in place.

I have an appointment with the radiation oncologist this week and plan to ask him more directly what the deal is with these scar tissue growths. Will the tissue ever stop trying to repair itself in such a grand fashion? Or will scar tissue be a regular, ongoing problem?