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Oral cancer survivor relearns how to speak
After undergoing a tongue reconstruction surgery, an oral cancer survivor is relearning how to speak.
NEWNAN, Ga. - Becki Goggins of Montgomery, Alabama, first noticed something was off in spring 2022.
"I thought I had bitten my tongue," Goggins says. "That's how this all started."
At first, Goggins says she thought she may have had an infection in the back of her mouth. She sees her dentist every six months, so she decided to get it checked out.
"He had prescribed some antibiotics," she says. "And, I went back, and he said, 'I just don't like the looks of this.'"
That's when Goggins, director of law and policy for a national justice consortium, learned she had a mass in the back of her mouth, tucked under her tongue.
When a biopsy revealed Goggins had oral cancer, she came to City of Hope Atlanta in Newnan to undergo surgery to remove the mass, along with part of her tongue, and rebuild a tongue flap using skin and tissue taken from her left forearm.
It was a major surgery, but Goggins felt it was her only option.
"It was a pretty simple decision because it was pretty painful at the time," she says. "I mean, it was obvious something had to be done."
Once she had healed from the first operation, Goggins began working with Jennifer Cargile, a City of Hope speech language pathologist.
For the first few months, Cargile says, they were making real progress with both eating and speaking.
"We were like, 'Oh, man, we are on the road to recovery,'" Cargile explains. "But then, because of the findings of the surgery, she had to do radiation as well. And what we noticed is the first few weeks of radiation were rolling along, and then the side effects of radiation hit."
The radiation caused Goggins' newly-constructed tongue flap to tighten and become uneven, making it harder for her to speak.
So, they went back to her surgeon.
"And [we] said, 'Hey, you know, we're well after the initial surgery. She's healed, and there's no evidence of disease. Is there anything that we can do to make that flap a little less bulky?'" Cargile remembers. "And he was, like, 'Sure, I can do a scar revision.'"
Six weeks after that operation, Goggins began speech therapy again.
"I know you're still hearing some distortion; it's still there," she says. "This is better than it was."
"She's really having to be conscious about where she's placing her tongue, and really being conscious about slowing down, so that that way her sounds don't blend together," Cargile says.
The two also working on eating, which comes with an additional challenge. Some patients who have tongue reconstruction lose their sense of taste.
"The only thing I've really noticed is everything tastes very salty," Goggins says.
Much of Becki Goggins' job involves speaking in front of large groups at conferences and meetings, so getting comfortable with that is a major goal for them.
"She just wants people to be able to listen to her message without getting caught up on, 'Well, why does she sound different,'" Cargile explains. "I think she also has the goal of she wants to be able to eat and not have to sit there and think about eating … to just eat, and do it quickly."