Hello there,

I had earlier written but didn't post because the replies you get on here will invariably be from people who have had cancer, not from people who thought they had it but didn't. They wouldn't be on a cancer chat forum trying to help fellow sufferers.

I only post now, as my experience might help you to understand that even if your condition were to turn out to be cancerous, which your doctor thinks unlikely, it is very treatable, especially if caught early.

I had a swollen right tonsil through an infection, not tonsillitis. It was not sore, and it wouldn't have been spotted if I hadn't looked inside my mouth in the mirror one day.

The infection didn't respond to different types of antibiotics that were prescribed following 2 needle biopsies, and so it was removed. In the post-operative biopsy, they discovered it was cancerous. The cancer had opened the door to the infection.

But like I said, my tonsil was not sore, so my condition was different to yours. There is a very good chance that yours is something completely different.

I was lucky in that we caught it at stage one. Following a clear PET-CT scan, which was recommended by the oncology team to whom I had now been referred, it was decided that another operation was quite possibly the best course of action. If the biopsy came back clear I could avoid radio/chemo therapy. They removed further tonsil tissue from the margins, and performed a radical neck dissection removing lymph nodes. None of the tissue removed showed signs of cancer so my treatment finished there.

I was unlucky, however, in that 9 months later, in the course of an operation for a neck abscess that developed out of nowhere, my other tonsil (left) was discovered to be cancerous. They achieved clear margins when removing the tonsil, and miraculously the biopsy of the tissue (lymph nodes) removed in a left neck dissection showed no signs of cancer, so my treatment was considered over. Again I had avoided radio/chemo therapy.

It has since been a game of wait and see, visiting my consultant for regular clinical examinations. It's almost 3 years now since operation 2, and I'm still clear. My consultant says there's very little chance of recurrence from here on in, so at the moment, my story is one of hope.

Tim

Thanks for the response. I hope you're doing better now.

The doctor also said she's seen people with chronic tonsilitis where the tonsil didn't go down for months and it was something relatively harmless.  

Thanks. Yes.

Life will never be the same again. But in many ways, having to come to terms with the close proximity of one's own mortality has made life a lot richer.

But for you and your condition, there are many other possible and more likely causes than cancer. 

Let us know how you get on, and in the very unlikely event that it is something sinister, you can find a lot of support and help from some of the very kind souls on here. 

I wish I had known about it when I went through the early stages!

Best wishes

 Tim