Hi zarker...would like to know how you are doing? I'm going thru the same except when I cough and gag it is painful...feels like throat is ripping...hard to eat...parts of mouth is sensitive and throws me into coughing fit...help!!!

Just stumbled across your post. Zarkers post is an old one - 2011 - so I expect he is fully back enjoying life and doesn’t check in here now. However, I also had surgery twice and 20 radiation treatments to my stage 1 vocal cord cancer which was completed 6 months ago. The 2 weeks after the treatment finished were the worst. I literally did not stop coughing for 2 weeks solid, day and night. I couldn’t get my breath, couldn’t sleep and couldn’t bring anything up other than white sputum. I was totally exhausted and thought it would never end. The coughing ceased completely after about 3 months and now I am having still to constantly clear my throat as there is still plentiful mucous down there which just will not come out. I have tried different catarrh linctus’ , steaming with menthol oils and various mouth washes.. nothing appears to work. I believe that the radiation to this highly sensitive area permanently damages the throat linings and we just have to live with it. It gets better with time until it really is just a minor inconvenience... I am very grateful that at present there is no sign of any cancer and that I can speak, eat and breathe normally, that is the bottom line. My medical team tell me this is completely normal when recovering from rads to the vocal cords and I am now totally used to it. You will get better slowly and hopefully a year down the line this will all be a bad dream. We will be monitored frequently for the next 5 years ( my next appointment is tomorrow ) and so we’re very fortunate that the disease was discovered at an early stage. There is a 90% cure rate, so we will be fine. Good luck going forward, any further enquiries I would be happy to aid you with.

Just stumbled across your post. Zarkers post is an old one - 2011 - so I expect he is fully back enjoying life and doesn’t check in here now. However, I also had surgery twice and 20 radiation treatments to my stage 1 vocal cord cancer which was completed 6 months ago. The 2 weeks after the treatment finished were the worst. I literally did not stop coughing for 2 weeks solid, day and night. I couldn’t get my breath, couldn’t sleep and couldn’t bring anything up other than white sputum. I was totally exhausted and thought it would never end. The coughing ceased completely after about 3 months and now I am having still to constantly clear my throat as there is still plentiful mucous down there which just will not come out. I have tried different catarrh linctus’ , steaming with menthol oils and various mouth washes.. nothing appears to work. I believe that the radiation to this highly sensitive area permanently damages the throat linings and we just have to live with it. It gets better with time until it really is just a minor inconvenience... I am very grateful that at present there is no sign of any cancer and that I can speak, eat and breathe normally, that is the bottom line. My medical team tell me this is completely normal when recovering from rads to the vocal cords and I am now totally used to it. You will get better slowly and hopefully a year down the line this will all be a bad dream. We will be monitored frequently for the next 5 years ( my next appointment is tomorrow ) and so we’re very fortunate that the disease was discovered at an early stage. There is a 90% cure rate, so we will be fine. Good luck going forward, any further enquiries I would be happy to aid you with.

Thanks again

I appreciate you sharing your experience with me.