i am 9 mos post treatments. my dry mouth is still here but i do have a tiny bit of sticky saliva on the right side. the left salivary glands are dead. i am hoping other survivors ahead of me who had IMRT can tell me if their saliva is still sticky or if it ever gets wet again. if any of you still have sticky saliva with dry mouth, do you ever get used to it? this dry, sticky feeling in my mouth is driving me cRaZy!!!

Yep, know the feeling well.

I am 15 months post and I am still getting the sticky stuff, alltho I must say that in the past month or so, I have noticed what I think is a bit of a thinning. Then again, maybe I'm just getting used to it.

If I am remembering correctly, you are taking Saligen?

Things I have noticed:
I stay away from Caffeine and soft drinks with aspartame.
Splenda sweetened stuff works fine for me.
Nothing with MSG work for me, simply drys me out for several hours.
Your mileage will vary, the key is experimentation and try to develop the patterns to the stuff that affects you.

I will say, it's MUCH better than the alternative !

Kevin

Regarding saliva production.
The parotid glands produce a more watery secretion. ie. no mucous secretion which would be slippery and coat your mouth/teeth. The submandibular glands produce 70% of the saliva, and produce lubrication.

What one experiences after the dust settles and you are healed up is highly dependent on what was destroyed by the radiation and that depends on the irradiation field and how sensitive the individual is to the radiation. In my case, at least one of the parotids was completely spared and the other one likely also survived. This means that I have saliva but it is watery. At this point my submandibular and sublingual glands are not functional to any appreciable extent. The lack of slippery saliva makes swallowing dry stuff more difficult and you teeth also feel rough......
I drink coffee but now I use a lot more cream, at this point I am totally off soft drinks or anything that is carbonated.

Do any of you use the biotene gum or any other chewing gum?

And yes the alternative to these issues would really suck!

M

kevin, yes i am taking salagen (actually the generic form called pilocarpine). i can't tell if it is really working though.

i hope your saliva IS actually thinning. it would be hard for me to get used to my mouth feeling this way all the time. i keep holding out with hope because i just can't accept that i'd have to deal with this for the rest of my life!

007,

You've heard this many times before but each of us recover differently due to the many variables that go into our Tx and recovery equation. My best advice for you is to stop worrying about how you will "end up" and just let it happen. I am now 19 months post Tx and I may be finished (?) but I really don't have much say in that regard now. Just keep doing all the healthy things you can for yourself and your body will do the rest.