Generally speaking, oral cancer patients can eat on their own about three weeks after surgery, but there are great differences between patients’ conditions and individuals. If the oral cancer surgery is relatively small in early stage, the time of eating on your own can be advanced, and you can eat on your own in a week or so at the earliest. If oral cancer surgery is relatively large or flap repair is done, the healing time is slower and the time to eat on your own may be three weeks, one month or even longer. Therefore, there is no fixed period for eating after oral cancer surgery, it depends on different conditions, different people, whether the healing is smooth or not, and whether there are any complications.