I had about the same surgery, it sounds like, and I had numbness in most of my neck for 8 months. It came back. It was not nerve damage, just swelling. I also had another surgery of my chest and my laryngeal nerve has a lot of problems, basically sometimes I have a voice, sometimes I don't. They keep telling me it will come back eventually - no nerve damage, just swelling they say again.

hi, i had a totalthyroidectomy 3 years ago and still my neck feels numb!! not all the time, but sometimes.. when you think of whats happened inside your neck its no wonder it takes time!! you will get used to the feeling and before long it will be the norm!!

I had a total thyroidectomy and a tumor removed from the top of my larynx in May, 2006. My whole neck and even my chin was numb for about a year, but eventually the feeling came back. Mine stayed numb so long that when the feeling came back, it felt unnatural. I also have the voice problem. Most of the time my voice is real raspy, but I am alive and have a voice. I could have lost my voice completely because of the location of my tumor. Just give it time and I think most of the numbness will go away. They also told me that my numbness was from nerve damage, but said the nerves would repair themselves and they did.

I had it 13 years ago and the feelings do come back but it does take several years and even still sometimes I get patches of numbness in my neck near the site, but the sholder numbness came back within about 9 months and the neck took several years but did come back.