Ok, I am an 18 year old college student. I have felt something weird on my tongue and looked in the mirror and it is huge white lump on the side of my tongue. I noticed it a while a go but it is huge now and I can feel it when ever I move my tongue around. Am I crazy to think this could be oral cancer and should I go see a doctor about it. I am just confused, I also have had an earache on the side of my tongue this thing is growing on. HELP. I also heard oral cancer only happens to drinkers and smokers and I am neither of them.
Thanks

Kendra,

Please have that checked by a doctor possibly an ear, nose and throat specialist as soon as possible especially if the lump is growing and there is pain associated with it.

I do not mean to worry you but in our case, my family member, who is not a smoker, had an ulcer on the side of the tongue which we did not think anything of it and we let it go for over two months. Initially the ulcer was small but it had grown to over 1 centimeter by the time we went to go see the ENT.

When we did see the ENT he did a biopsy and it turned out to be cancer. I am not saying this is your case and I sincerely hope that it is not but it is better to be cautious in this case and also for your own piece of mind.

Best wishes to you. Let us know what happens after you visit your doctor.

Kendra, Take a deep breath. Yes you should have this looked at by an ENT. It is impossible for us to say what it is or is not. There are things other than cancer it might be. It would be really rare at your age to be cancer but get it checked soon and tell us what you find out.

Don't delay -- See an ENT as quickly as you can; he/she will likely have to cut a piece out and send it to a lab for biopsy to be sure.

If it is something cancerous, the quicker it is gotten out of there, the better, because it would spread and can easily be dealt with in the early stages.

Pete

Thanks, I will make an appointment with my doctor today. What should I expect?
Kendra

Hi Kendra,

If the doctor thinks it is suspicious, he/she will do a biopsy. It will require local anesthesia and a small piece of your tongue will be removed. You won't feel anything. You will probably have some small stitches that will dissolve on their own. It may take a week to get the results of the biopsy and the waiting can be difficult.

You are doing the right thing since cancer has no rules. I had cancer on my tongue with no risk factors.

Good luck and please keep us informed.

Jerry

Hi Kendra, get checked, Sweetie..no sense in waiting and worrying. Please let us know your results, and I am hoping for a good one. Carol

Kendra, and anyone else who might be to shy to ask, the most difficult part of an event in one's life like this is the agonizing over the decision to do something, or the waiting for an answer -- In retrospect, the actualities of the doing or the answer (either good or bad) are not as bad as what we impose on ourselves while trying to make a decision.

I personally believe that our senses of denial can be very strong, and the act of making an appointment, or in this case, your first step of posting here for advice, conflict with that denial because that first step is also recognition that something COULD be wrong, so making the step is hard.

As far as what happens, I have been having suspicious lesions biopsied for over a decade, but this time I had something more like what you describe -- It doubled in size in two weeks, but because I had been given a steroid rinse for irritation at the biopsied sites, I at first thought it was a callous of some sort. My powers of denial and self-deceit continue to amaze me! I finally kicked myself in the butt and went to the ENT.

He looked at it and said "That doesn't belong there and it needs to be biopsied", so he scheduled ambulatory surgery for two days later and took it out. Waiting for the biopsy results was hard and then I had to make an office visit to get the results (apparently in Washington, biopsy results cannot be given over the phone).

Clearly, the first moment I was suspicious of that growth, I should have be off to the ENT like a rocket! Fortunately, it didn't make much difference in my case.

Pete

Kendra, There is lots of good advice here for you. The process of getting checked is fairly painless and really, really needs to be done as soon as possible. Don't put this off, even if the growth starts to shrink. There are several possible causes and you need to know as soon as you can. Don't talk yourself out of going in. You will feel so much better with a definitive answer. Let us know what you find out. Tom

Who would this appointment be made with?
Thank You.