OK, decided to skip the clinical terms for once in a great while.......cuz, well......I'm always so clinical! Nope, this is raw so hold onto your bonnets!
Yesterday was treatment 3 of 5. Number 4 is day after tomorrow and then the final one next Tuesday.
The good news is, I did not feel like someone dropped a hot coal in my pelvis last night, nor today. That's welcome. I mean, thank you! I mean it's so nice and I slept well! I can also say I have not felt any major urgency to pee nor poop today. I have tried to be conscious of when I felt like I even might need to pee or poop and I did so without waiting.
Pee
The not so good news is that burning when I do pee is becoming a more common occurrence each day as is a slow start. That's different as, other than once about 20 years ago, I've never had any problem taking a leak. Zero. Zilch. None. Even at my "advanced" age with my enlarged, disease ridden prostate, I've just always been able to pee....at will. But, that's how guys are built (BAD design flaw! I mean REALLY bad....but I digress), with the pee tube running right through The Manjuice Gland, which is prone to gettin’ swole and The Big C. As they use 3d shaped beams to try and kill tumor and gland, the pee tube and, to a lesser extent, the bottom of the bladder will get radiation. And that means irritation, swelling and........possible damage (although after doing my due diligence and reading/comparing the studies, that tends to be on the low end of the complication scale). Right now, I'm going with irritation and swelling which, in most cases, subsides in 3 months +/-. In the mean time, I'll meditate and run the faucet. 😳 May make slight grunting sounds as well.
Poop
The so so news is that my poop habits are a bit different (shape.....can you say pooplet?, frequency) but I'm pooping and there's been very little diarrhea and none in the last couple of days........and for this we are grateful. Not so fun is the rectal burning I feel which is not too dissimilar from that feeling your butt hole gets after you ate a bunch of habanero tacos topped with some ghost pepper sauce. OK, I'm kidding, it's not that bad. But when it is, well, it is. But this is still a minor complaint and I once again am happy about having had the SpaceOAR gel implant injected in my taint at the same time the gold bullseyes were placed. My Rad nurse said she had seen two other men go through SBRT and they had few to no issues and that it was "a very smart thing to do." I agree. OK, so hire me as a spokesman SpaceOAR! I'm not expensive.
Pecker Performance
Surprisingly quite good. While I had used ED drugs at times since the chemo/hormone regimen, I could get a hard on generally without them. As a prophylactic measure, I started taking 60 mgs sildenafil (gen Viagra) which works by increasing blood flow in arteries and certainly in the groin (which feeds important nerves) and in Mr. Happy (I'm sorry, couldn't bring myself to write "dick"). Several studies seemed to show benefit and a couple were inconclusive about it, but things feel quite normal in that ability as one might expect with the father's little helper running around in my system. Most men come back to baseline function within the previously mentioned 3 months +/- although at 5-7 years out, function seems to take a hit. So I'm optimistic in the short term that things will be normal, at least for a few years.
Thank you for letting me skip the clinology! All future posts will be clinical in nature.....but this was kind of freeing!😛 Burp!
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