Parotid gland tumor. Will need surgery. Your experience at Mayo?

I was diagnosed with Salivary Ductal Carcinoma after noticing a lump in my neck and ultimately having it biopsied. I live in CA and went to UCI. My surgeon Dr. Yarah Haidar, has experience in this kind of cancer and facial reconstruction. The surgery took 10 hours. The cancer had spread into my cheek, nerves and muscle tissue in that area. Also in 25 out of 26 lymph nodes and was popping out of all of them. My surgeon had to take tissue and a nerve from my thigh and put it in my face. I had a neck dissection, huge long incision from behind my ear to the middle of my throat. She had to cut my facial nerves to get the cancer out. So currently the right side of my face is paralyzed. She put a sling in the corner of my mouth to lift it. My eye droops but she is going to do a surgery to lift it later. I have a weight in my eyelid to help me close my eye. She grafted in nerves so I will have facial movement back. My surgeon said probably 70% from the bottom of my eye down. It won’t be perfect but I’m okay with that. The recovery was tough. The drain in my leg got infected but was okay after they pulled it out and put me in antibiotics. I had terrible terrible nerve pain in my neck and jaw area. Apparently that was good but it was the worst pain I have ever felt! Now it’s gotten much better but some of it is still there. I am about 7 weeks post op and feeling good. Still some swelling but my face doesn’t look bad although I’m looking forward to the rest of the swelling decreasing and my movement coming back! On Monday I will start 6 weeks of radiation every day M-F and chemo once a week. I’m calling this part 2 of this process. I’m just recently feeling good and getting my energy back and now getting ready to walk through the valley of the shadow of death again. I believe in Jesus and prayer and this is what keeps me going every day. I think having a positive attitude helps but in the moment it’s hard and it’s painful and you ask why me? I’m not looking forward to the next six weeks and the side affects that I may have but I’ll survive and hopefully be cancer free. It’s a hard journey but maybe I can use my story to someday help someone else going through this.

May God bless you!