Looking for hope! Managing after treatment for tongue cancer

bonnie2172, the inflammation from the radiation can take 2 to 6 weeks to calm down. If you can get hyperbaric oxygen treatments you can quicken the healing. Your taste buds will probably return. It takes a little longer if you had chemotherapy. The fatigue from radiation should be lightening up a little. Just rest though because your body needs it. It is a good time to stream movies, though most of them these days will put you to sleep. Radiation is hard on bone marrow where our red blood cells are made. It takes a while to reproduce them. Recovery is so gradual that you sort of don't notice. You've been though torture. This will be the easy part.
Just rest.

Thanks for the encouragement! I want to believe I will be myself again. I just keep hanging on to positive thoughts.

@bonnie2172, I moved your discussion about looking for hope after treatment for tongue and throat cancer to the Head & Neck Cancer support group here: https://connect.mayoclinic.org/group/head-neck-cancer/ You can use the search bar to find topics relevant to you.

First, I want you to know, you're not alone. I'm tagging fellow survivors like @hrhwilliam @sepdvm @alpaca @srm @clevyjam and many others who know the realities of treatment after effects and how they cope and find hope.

Bonnie, it looks like radiation ended only 2 weeks ago for you. Do I have that right?

@colleenyoung
Finished radiation almost 3 weeks ago now. Thanks for moving my discussion to the correct place.

@bonnie2172 Hello. I am sad you lost part of your tongue on top of everything else. Almost everyone
lost their taste for several weeks to several months after radiation treatment. For me, salt was the first to return.
This all takes a few months rather than days or weeks. Think of your progress in either a week by week or perhaps a month by month basis. Am I better this month than last month? And even with that, you will have back steps on occasion.
We are so used to healing from injuries or surgeries rather quickly. Healing from cancer, primarily the radiation and Chemotherapy if included, is a very slow process.
I wish you courage and better weeks ahead.

Thank you for responding to my comment. I'm trying my best to be patient & I know recovery is a very slow process. The amount of phelm and mucus I am spitting up is unreal. I can only sleep upright in my recliner and I am awakened every hour at the least, due to phelm running out of my mouth. This is truly disgusting and at times causes me to vomit. Any ideas to deal with this issue? Also, still have ulcers on my tongue, and I'm gargling with salt &baking soda rinse. No taste buds have returned yet. I am able to swallow a small amount of water but that is it. I currently
Have a feeding tube due to weight loss. Every thing else I try to swallow or eat just irritates my tongue & makes the ulcers worse. I have tried broth, jello, ice cream and cream of wheat. Any idea what I could slowly introduce to my mouth which won't irritate my tongue so much. I am about 3 weeks out of radiation & I'm wondering when I will feel somewhat better... Trying to have faith and stay positive!