The ways others react to news of your prostate cancer

I get this too . Some say "people never die from this one, if its caught early - YOUR LUCKY ! " . When I say " did you know more men die of prostate cancer then people die of Breast cancer but Prostate Cancer only gets about 2% of the funding " , their jaw hits the floor . They have no clue , but are generally well meaning. People these days have no clue about civics, current events, and Medical Corporations. No interest and no exposure to real information . Just got back from Bratislava, Athens, Cyprus and Budapest for 2 weeks of meetings ( then the train to Ukraine boarder) . they are much more informed there on the travesty of war , current events, and medical corporations . Amazing ! They know about Cancer, treatments and costs than we do here. Went to a dentist in Hungary . Very clean, excellent work , and friendly . Excellent job at 40% of the costs in Canada . My dentist in Canada said " best work I have ever seen on a simple crown replacement. " . The landscape for cancer treatments is changing so quick . Ever 3-5 years now its a new landscape ! God bless to all that read this , find your happiness and charity to others each day ! James on Vancouver Island . Canada .

Hiker, I want to know what you learned in Bratislava.

For cancer specifically (not dentistry 🙂) it seems to make a huge difference where you go in Canada. Big, multidisciplinary cancer centres associated with universities seem to be up on the latest treatments and best practices (that's been my experience); an individual urologist or radiation oncologist in a local hospital *might* be keeping up with the research, but from people's stories, it seems to be hit or miss.

We're hearing the same thing from our American neighbours here in the forum: they sometimes get a very different standard of care from a "Center of Excellence" than they do at their local hospitals.

When diagnosed I was at Gleason 9. Like most people, I knew nothing about prostate cancer. It was a punch in the stomach for me and my family. I thought quite a bit about whether or not I should tell my closest friends. If I don’t tell them, will they think I didn’t care enough about them? Eventually I told my four long time friends. It’s been two and a half years since I started treatment and I’m doing as well as can be expected. My quality of life is affected more by the treatment than the cancer, but I’m not sick, so to speak. At this point I wish I hadn’t told anyone. I don’t live near my friends so our communication is through phone and online media. People don’t know what to say, and in my case, none of them say anything. One of them keeps in contact like always but never asks me how I’m doing. The other three pretty much avoid contact. I don’t blame them. It’s a challenge seeing your friends get old and their health decline.

I am an open book about mine. I wear a drain bag. I need to wear long pants. That usually sends a look of shock when I hike my pant leg up. I dont care. I see myself as no less of a man. I think my biggest shock is that when I do say something on how many respond back that they have it or had it. I went to see the skin Dr that other day and waiting in the waiting room was a guy with shorts on and wearing a drain bag. I moved over to talk to him and he had some kind of bladder infection. But I thought well thats probably a little to open.

I share in stages. I'll start by talking about a "spinal injury", and that's enough for most casual acquaintances (the PCa compressed my spine and left me paraplegic for a while). Most don't ask any more questions.

If they do ask what caused the injury, I'll tell them "cancer". Usually it ends there. If they really want more details, I'm happy to share. I share completely with family and close friends, of course, as well as anyone else living with cancer. In public social-media posts, I just say I'm disabled and have a chronic illness, and respond privately if anyone asks.

I find that by leading with the effects rather than the name of the illness, I get fewer of the ignorant "prostate cancer is mostly harmless" responses.

I think its bullshit , someone said well at least you got the BABY CANCER, I thought I was gonna kill this guy , what the hell Is baby cancer and my response to him was pretty simple your an IDIOT . had to walk away my recovery is brutal had my prostate removed jan 8th 24 found out a week before Christmas , jan 16 was told Im metastic with stage 4 cancer with no hopes of ever ringing the bell Gleason score is a 4+5=9 very aggressive , but my favorite part of the whole nightmare it has completely made me a nut and because my PSA is down to .04 from a 25. bt I will tell you my side effects are much worse than any of the cancer pain itself.ive lost 7 fingers to some weird infection that MD Anderson is stumped , so my baby cancer keeps me up all night. , lost 7 fingers , have no sex , have to wear a diaper at the age of 60 and you call this baby cancer Fuck you . sorry about that but my life has been from close to retiring , to having to get my affairs in order ,YEAH BABY CANCER HUH . Good luck

I'm so sorry for everything you've gone through, @ltdan2021. The side effects are tough (mine were different, but also brutal), but it's fantastic news that your PSA is down to 0.04. And yeah, I don't mind if you swear when someone says something that ignorant to you.

It's one thing to admit "I don't know", but another to pretend you do and preach to someone about their own life experience.

Those close to me always start a conversation with "Are you doing OK?" vs. the old "How are you?" and I answer "yes, thanks for asking" and then, thankfully, they treat me the same as always. Some people I considered acquaintances have become friends and been extremely kind and helpful. Others I thought were friends have disappeared.

One of my side effects has been excessive weight loss. I feel nauseous a lot of the time and just don't want to eat. I have had people comment about that and, indirectly, try to "help" by bringing me lots of high calorie baked goods when they come to visit.

After living over 2 months barely able to eat after my spinal surgery, I realised what a unappreciated gift an appetite is. I hope yours comes back soon.