Thanks for the replies and encouragement from everyone!

I will keep my fingers crossed that the hair on the back of my head will grow - back but facial hair I can live without! (Not that I'm admitting to having much.)

I had a bad experience today and am wondering if the same thing has happened to anyone else. When going through the hydration phase of my chemotherapy today I had to go to the toilet. Drip trolley in hand I went to the nearby bathroom and on my way realised that I was swallowing what I thought was alot of salty saliva. When I got to the bathroom I looked at my mouth and realised that it was full of blood! I don't know how much I swallowed but it was flowing freely into the basin and wouldn't stop. I then got nursing help and they called my MO straight away.

The nurses applied some compresses to my tongue, which they identified as being the source of the bleed. It stopped within 10 minutes but it scared the hell out of me. The closest thing I can equate it to is like a severe nose bleed from the mouth. This has never happened after previous surgeries and the MO believes that radiation following my biopsy is the cause. A bit of the forming scar tissue on the side of my tongue evidently pulled away. The nurses said that I had a 1cm raw ulcer in the roof of my mouth and extensive mucositis, with open smaller ulcers pretty much everywhere else. (plus radiation damage and the raw biopsy area on my tongue) Some of these were also bleeding after having gauze put in.

After this 'episode' and an all clear from the MO my chemotherapy and radiation went ahead. I have had no other problems in the 9 hours since this happened but am worried that it might happen again. The Dr and nurses have told me to call an ambulance if it happens at home.

Is it likely to happen again? Has anyone had a similar problem - and if so I'd love to know what happened and especially if it recurred. I have 13 rads and 2 chemos to go.

Thanks everyone.

Sue