Cancer Recovery, PE and other things

Yeah, I forgot you’d said that while I was making my reply.

I *think* the reason they didn’t go in from the front in the old days was that the incisions would have to be very deep, and the surrounding tissues aren’t amenable to stretching enough to see and get tools in at the same time. With a laparoscopic procedure, the camera is in there with the tool. Mrs. Andy had rotator cuff surgery that way, back when it was a new-ish thing. We got a CD with still images from the surgery.

I think they tried to nibble around the urethra back in the old days, using mirrors and guesswork. But the urethra heals very fast, at least when damaged by PE, so maybe it just makes more sense to get it out of the way to get room to work and then hook it back up.

SDAY + 2.
-21 degrees, real feel is -18 though. 8-12 inches of snow in the forecast starting this afternoon, so hopefully I will get discharged this morning and home before that kicks off. Clear sky and the sun is about to peak over the top of the mountain.

I feel a lot better today and looking forward to being home, I am less distended in the stomach region, but have only been able to pass gas. I should have paid more attention to the bowel prep instructions as I think there would have been less discomfort had my bowels been completely empty. I have been up walking the halls yesterday and this morning, in an attempt to get the bowels going, it will surely be a relief when they finally move.

The nurse said the blood fluid leaking out of the end of my penis when I sit on the toilet is normal, so I am going to have to watch that when I get home.

Looking forward to seeing my doc today for a report on how the surgery went and what he found.

Stoppage of the bowels is a common side effect of opiates used for anesthesia.

Find out what they gave you, make a note of it, and see if you can talk to the anesthesiologist beforehand if you need surgery again. I’m allergic to most opiates, as in "stops breathing on the operating table." Not to mention horrific nausea after. Where I live, the go-to for anesthesia is intravenous Demerol. Time before last, the tech used Valium. Valium was great. I went to sleep, woke up, and only felt slightly queasy for a while afterward. The next time, the only thing the tech said she could do instead of Demerol was fentanyl. I’d never had that before. It was a reasonably good painkiller - they didn’t give me enough to knock me completely out - but I was having a hard time not throwing up. The reaction manifested as a bad taste in my mouth; like I imagine chewing on a nice fresh cat turd would taste. It took more than a day for that to go away. I was an unhappy camper.

Anyway, there are some other anesthetics that are supposedly a bit less dramatic to the bowels, that you might be able to choose if you can talk with the anesthesiologist.

From your description of the procedure, I think the nurse is telling it straight. It would be better if they told you about all this ahead of time, but maybe they’re afraid their patients would back out. Maybe they’re even right, but I hate being blindsided by stuff like that.

You might ask how long you should be leaking before you need to call and tell them about it.

It is not uncommon for men who have had damage to the urethra to develop urethral strictures - tight spots - in the the urethra. That usually manifests as a weak urine stream, inability to completely empty the bladder, or drippage when you’re tucking everything back away when you’re finished. If you start having problems, it’s easily corrected outpatient or DIY.

Video! And you want a copy of the written surgical notes, too. Now is a good time to start compiling your own medical records.

SDAY+3
I am home. I was discharged yesterday about 1600 local time. It has warmed up to considerably to 8 degrees with a fresh 3-4 inches of snow this morning. I was able to get a surgical report from my urologist. He said that the surgery went well, there were no areas that indicate that the cancer spread. He took a few surrounding lymph nodes , which is routine, and is sending everything to pathology. In six weeks, I will have labs and a follow up visit in his office. The labs will be a repeat PSA, which should be zero if the cancer did not spread beyond the prostate.

In the mean time, I have my catheter in place for another 5 days. A leg bag during the day and a larger bag to use at night. My drainage incision will close up by itself in a couple of days, meanwhile, dressing changes are required depending on how saturated those dressings become.

So I got home last night, got some meds in and things situated at home. Although I changed my dressings before bed, I leaked through during the night into a towel that I had placed on my bed to absorb any leakage. I will do a better job with that tonight, as I soiled my top sheet. I generated about 1200 cc’s of urine overnight into my night bag, and determined that the provided hose is not as long as I would like as it limits my movement in bed. The other thing is the height of my bed to the position of the bag is not very far, so this is a drainage thing that I don’t think that I can solve. I will just have to deal with it, limiting me to a couple of sleeping positions. I posted a picture of my incisions over on my other thread if anyone is interested. I am on weight restrictions (10lbs) lifting and no pulling, pushing or strenuous activity. walking and the occasional set of stairs is all that I am allowed to do.

Yay!

Move about and do as much as you can, subject to vertigo, etc. Resuming normal activity as soon as possible shortens overall recovery time.

SDAY+6 I am getting along good so far, except for the catheter. It is battling the end of my penis something fierce. I have applied lubricant and keep it clean, however it still pinches, and it still bleeds when I sit on the commode. My unit has thoroughly turtled in as far as it can. In terms of activity, I overdid it yesterday and was in a lot of pain and discomfort. I will be taking it a bit easier over the next few days, until the catheter is removed on Friday.

My urine output is good, but it changes color without any reason that I can detect. I can fill a bag and it is perfectly clear, then the next bag looks like cranberry juice. My drainage incision seems to have mostly sealed up, with just a small indication of leakage this afternoon, after applying a clean dry dressing this morning. I think I will leave this one on until tomorrow morning, then see what happens overnight. I think the end is near for dressing changes.

Tough duty man, good job!

Good attitude will pull you along.

So I woke up today with a large amount of bruising directly above my unit and down and around the right side of my ball sack. I have no idea. There was nothing that happened over night or the previous day. My abdominal drain is sealed up and not draining any fluid. I am on day two with the same dressing, so maybe all the fluid is going to the lowest spot? Additionally, my urine has changed colors. It is more of a brownish red. It resembles an Irish red beer. Sometimes it is fairly clear, other times it is dark red.

Anyway, these are all questions for the doc tomorrow. It is "Free Willy" day, as my catheter is supposed to be removed. They told me to bring some pads to slip into my underwear as I will undoubtedly leak a little here and there. So I guess I will need to wear some of that too. I had become to really enough wearing my long johns. I guess it is back to boxer briefs for the foreseeable future. One more milestone each day. And each day good or bad is closer to full recovery

Yay!

Internal bleeding can show up strangely. I fractured my left tibia a few years ago, and in a few days the toes on that leg turned black.

Hopefully this is normal for the procedure you had.

I saw my doc’s PA on Friday morning, got all the instructions about keagle exercises, etc. Told him hat my left nut was a little painful, like hurting pretty good and that I had a similar experience with an infection in the piping a few years back. I was prescribed the standard ciprofloxin and that would take care of that and any urinary infections that might come with the surgery and ensuing catheter. After the nurse pulled the catheter, which seemed to be about three feet long, willy was free.

I made it to the pharmacy straight from his office and bought a bottle of water, wanting to get antibiotics on board as soon as I could. I took another dose before bed. During the day, I consumed around 40mg of hydrocodone and kicked it a little bit with some brandy. I was quite miserable and went to bed about 8 pm. About 10:30 I woke up in quite severe pain, called for my wife and ultimately made it to the ER. Sonogram revealed a quite inflamed left nut. Levofloxin, a 10 day course was prescribed. Being still the middle of the night, I would not able to get the new antibiotic in until the next day. I continued my cipro in the morning and then stacked the levoquin on top. By that night, my ball sack was firm, painful to the touch and about the size of a baseball. I have been taking it easy since, keeping an ice pack on my nut sack. My recommendation for anyone, if you experience testicular pain, start on antibiotics right away.

Sitting, getting up from sitting, and getting in and out of the car is the most painful and generally the weakest point for leaking out a little bit of urine, which is starting to clear up, as mine is little pink still. Drink lots and lots of fluids.

When I started this post, I promised myself that I would lay it all out regardless of what other people think, I don’t really give a crap. So here it is. While at times over the past few days I have questioned my treatment decision, I know that it was the guaranteed cure.

I finished my course of antibiotics yesterday. I still have a little bit of left nut pain but I am feeling much better, back to work, light duty, and taking it easy. I will drop some urine next week to make sure that the infection is gone. Since it is no longer so painful, I attempted to get an erection. No erection whatsoever is possible. None, not going to happen no matter what visual or manual stimulation was attempted. This was a disappointment and kind of sucks. I attempted twice over the past couple of days to get hard and I can only get about a third of the way. Two limp dick orgasms were the result. One other aspect is the end of my dick hurts like hell when I urinate, towards the end of my stream mostly. I can’t explain it other than I can sometimes get a good solid stream, occasionally the stream is all fanned out like what a person would use to rinse the car off, then as the stream weakens, the end of my unit starts hurting pretty intensely. I am thinking that this is due to the catheter stretching the hell out of the valve at the tip of my dick for so long.

I guess I will need to talk to the nurse about this issue if it doesn’t resolve in the next few days. Good news is that I am mostly peeing standing again, which is a win. I am occasionally leaking a little when going from sitting to standing, or if I am not paying attention. I have found out that when you think you need to go, don’t wait. Pads inside my boxer briefs capture the little mishaps, so I am not quite in diapers, but the pads are a bit of a nuisance and a bit of a hit on my general masculinity.

Since I can’t get erect, there is no possibility of measurements of BPEL. My pump is broken, so a new one is going to have to be ordered. One reason I started PE was to gain length that I might lose with the surgery. Some lose as much as an inch. My unit retracted or turtled significantly and was that way for a couple of weeks, especially due to the infection. My BPFSL was about 7" prior to the surgery. The most I can get is about 6 1/2". So if that is what was lost, I think I am ok with it. I just want to get back to PE as soon as possible. I think I am going to start with some light mechanical stretching and maybe some light weight hanging. I really don’t see how this would affect much since the ureathra is so elastic. Any thoughts about this, reply.

Still no erection possible so I pumped for the first time last night. All I can say is it was painful, on the lowest setting, and I was cautious to not exceed the 30 minute session. I applied a soft band to my base afterwards to keep me full through the night, this morning, there was considerable edema. I applied a full length sleeve to deal with that which helped. I have some residual pain in my scrotum today, although I did hang lower and experienced a fuller flaccid state most of the day. I think I will give it a few more days before I try again.

I saw a video a couple weeks ago with Dr. Trost. He brought up some post-prostectomy stats with the restorex that reminded me of your situation. If I remember right, the idea with the aftercare with stretching and everything is that the initial shortening is from the shock to the surrounding tissue after the surgery, but that many months later fibrosis will set in causing the permanent shortening. I’m not a urologist or anything close to it, but I’d keep doing some type of pe as long as it doesn’t hurt much and the surgeon is okay with it.

Thanks. I have been doing a little bit of manual stretching and some minimal vacuum chamber stuff, but OMG. I am approaching the six week mark, which is when I should be good to go. So after I reach the six week mark, I will be back to doing as much as I can. I am thinking that my traction device, manual stretching, light pumping, and ads. Hanging is yet to be determined. Half of me thinks, what is the point since I cannot even get erect. Thanks for the encouragement and information.

It has been a while, so here is the current update. No erection is possible. While I am feeling a little fuller in the morning and during "physical therapy", I am at times somewhat depressed that I cannot get an erection. I have been trying to stimulate the little guy back into action. After about 30 minutes using a hand held vibrator up and down on my limp somewhat half erect shaft, I can reach orgasm. This orgasm is different than I thought it would be. They are pretty intense and the pulsating feeling is still there, which I thought would be gone or diminished after the prostate removal.

I saw the cute, petite, PA at the urology clinic, and after a detailed physical exam of my scrotum, she determined that my infection in my left testicle is resolved. In any other case, since I am particularly modest, because my dick is short, I would be hesitant. Since I knew that I had no shot at getting aroused, It was a little cold that day, and well lets just say, there was considerable shrinkage and turtling. In the end, I was a little bit embarrassed but think I covered over with a little humor. She advised me to take ibuprophin every six hours to help deal with the lingering left testicle discomfort and the burning/pain during the end of my urination stream. I explained to her my PE regime and said that 6 weeks is kind of the base line healing time for my surgical procedure. I also talked to her about not being able to get errection. She said that it could take up to a year.

So the one issue that has happened twice now is that I have wet the bed during the middle of the night. Both incidents were completely out of the blue. I promised to tell all, no matter what, but this is embarrassing. After the first time, I put down a cotton hospital type barrier which helped contain the incident the second time. My recommendation for anyone else is to get some sort of barrier to protect your mattress. When this is over, I will burn mine.

The last tidbit of info is to find a way to compensate. I bought an unlimited tanning package and have focused on the things that I can control. My eating habits, exercise, weight reduction, improving the physical aspects that I can, all of which affects confidence in my outward appearance, just as much as the confidence gained with my PE results.