June 25th - Finally. Got all sorts of good information. Fun facts:

- I'll be in the hospital for ~7 days.
- I will be out of work for 6-8 weeks.
- I will be eating soft food before being discharged from the hospital.
- It will take ~3 weeks for the swelling to go down. Won't be doing much talking until then and will definitely have trouble talking. No mention of a speech therapist. I think it's a wait and see how I do type of thing.
- I will no longer have taste buds on the right hand side of my mouth. Physician's Assistant (PA) says all food will taste awful for quite a while, especially with the radiation treatments but eventually the taste of food will "normalize".
- Not definite about radiation being needed yet (but surgeon seemed pretty sure). If it does happen, it will be 5 days a week for 6-7 weeks, approximately 20 minute long appointments. I'm told it's like getting x-rays taken by the dentist but much stronger, since they're trying to kill the cancer cells.
- Most people who get oral cancer are men who are over the age of 65. PA says I'm weird (but we knew that, right?)
- ~10-12 lymph nodes will be removed. PA says it's one long incision down the side of my neck. Yay! Another scar!
- Periodic CAT scans will be needed to "keep an eye" on the enlarged lymph node on the left side of my neck.
- Humans have hundreds of lymph nodes in their body whose job it is to fight infection. Removing 10-12 of them will not affect my immune system at all.

I think that's all the good stuff. Let me know if you can think of any questions that I forgot. I will have another chance on Wednesday to ask more questions.