Hurt to swallow

Everybody is different.  I started getting soups down at about 3 weeks out....still had pain, but could do it.  At three weeks out you have probably just now finished cooking from the rads.  Improvement comes in weeks, not days.....I tried something everyday....water mostly to "test" to see how things were going.....also milk.  Be sure to swallow something everyday just to keep those muscles working....hurt or not....you don't want to lose your swallower. 

Patience is the key at this stage of the game..... 

p

It is hard to accept, but it is a matter of weeks and months rather than days to recover from rads.

I spent 2 months on prescription pain meds in the attempt to take in calories by mouth.  I found that I could control pain with just one tablet of hydroc/apap ever 5 hours, but if I wanted to really swallow something, I needed to take up to two every 6 hours.  I was able to get off of the pills by the end of the 2nd month after rads, but it was still very difficult to eat or swallow calories by mouth.  I drank a lot of Target brand nutrition shakes, lots of chocolate milk fortified by heavy cream and soup, but it wasn't until mid to late September (rads ended July 5) that I could actually eat solid foods.  It took that long for my throat to return to a more normal size. 

Not to discourage you, but it is a long recovery, here I am more than a year later and still have some issues with saliva, but it is slowly - and I do mean SLOWLY coming back.

give it time, it will get better