Radiation appointment and fused palate.....

I was actually looking forward to my appointment with Dr. Brizel (Radiation Oncologist) today. I had some questions for him as well as one Kelly wanted me to cover. She has been concerned that I'm still taking the oxycodone after a year but he and the resident both said to not worry about it. When it is time to come off, it will be gradual but the fact that I still have pain shows I still need it. It is true that I sleep through a dose from time to time but as Dwight pointed out today, most of the time I wake up. When he examined my neck, it was still quite painful; especially on the left side which is numb from the outside unless you put a little pressure on it. It might stay numb

since the feeling hasn't come back yet. I'm talking about the actual feel of touch to the skin. Before he examined me, I told him about how my tongue as been contracting (spasms) as well as how I can breathe in through my nose but can not breathe out through my nose or blow it. I blamed it on my the issues with my tongue but after examining me, he told me my palate has fused almost together due to scar tissue from the surgery and radiation. When he put the scope up through my nose and down to my throat, he almost couldn't get it through that area. He showed us a picture of how it works - when I breathe in through my nose, it pushes the palate open a tiny bit but when I try to breathe out, it slams it shut completely. He assured us that the pain and the palate are because he and Dr. Scher "whupped up on me pretty hard" between the extremely aggressive surgery AND radiation BUT how it was necessary because my diagnoses was a VERY, VERY MEAN cancer. I assured him that I would learn to live with it because I am so happy that I am still HERE and I give them both all the credit for being so aggressive. They had both tried to prepare us for it and now it is just going to take time. As far as the palate goes - I told him I can always breathe out through my mouth and thank goodness we have Kleenex to help me "go up there" for anything that needs to come out. He laughed at that and said, "exactly".  I had to mention how proud we were of how he saved the little girl's life on the airplane and he smiled real big.  I will see Dr. Scher in 3 months and Dr. Brizel again in 6 months. He wants me to get my flu shot and shingle shot right away. Oh joy.