Question: About a month ago I experienced swelling of what I believe were two of my salivary glands on the left side of my head. One located behind the bend of my jaw where my earlobe is, and the other positioned on my cheek at the side of my head close to where the joint of my jaw is. The glands swelled suddenly when I sat down to eat. It was painful, a sharp, deep pain on the side of my face, and I could physically feel the swelling happening. Within a couple of minutes the side of my face/upper neck was puffed out. The swelling persisted for a couple of days, with the swollen areas being tender when pressure was applied to them. Eventually the swelling went away for a couple of days, but I had a recurrence almost exactly the same as the first episode a week later. After the first episode I noticed that a few times a day I am experiencing a salty taste on the left side of my mouth. It comes in slowly at first then the taste washes over my gums and molars on that side of my mouth. It is over within 30 seconds to a minute. It is not associated with eating, it happens when I'm not eating or thinking about food. It could also happen when I'm eating but I haven't noticed.

The salty taste continues to plague me every few hours. The tenderness has been gone for over two weeks now. I cannot detect a difference in my salivary glands on the right vs left side, but I'm not really sure what they would normally feel like. I have not had any headache, fevers, diarrhea, vomiting, or neurological problems. Within the last week I have begun to decrease my caffeine intake and I'm still getting these taste episodes several times a day. I eat a higher fat, lower carbohydrate diet. My BMI is 26. I'm 35 years old. I see the dentist regularly and have good oral health. I cannot detect any lesions on my gums or mucosa of my mouth. I drink several glasses of water daily, my mouth is not dry, so I don't think I'm dehydrated.

Any ideas?