Uplifting and Hopeful Coming: Tracking meds and health

Yeah, we all respond differently. I insisted on cutting out all opioids a couple of days into post-op recovery from my spinal surgery, because they were messing with me (weird, vivid dreams that restarted every time I closed my eyes).

I had several bedside visits from the hospital pain doctors in the weeks that followed to make sure I was really OK without them. 🤷‍♂️

Honestly the worst pain for me is the CO2 they pump into you rising to the high points, for me that’s pretty horrific. That being said, I already cut out the Oxy except for one yesterday when that CO2 pain was too much - mostly because I’m able to get by on the Tylenol (except after a walk, then my abs are absolute killers) without it being a sacrifice. The problem I’m being careful of is the constipation from the Oxy, it plays against the stool softeners and Gas-X and makes THAT part of life extremely unpleasant to deal with.

I’ll just be glad to be rid of the catheter, it’s a constant annoyance and I’m ready to get on to learning my new normal for bladder control anyway.

The catheter is draining your bladder while the urethra heals.
My catheter was in for 10 days, and while I was very tired of it the last few days, I also wanted to heal fully; we all heal at different rates.
So my comment is remember the healing that hopefully is occurring, while accepting the annoying.
Be patient, positive and hopeful.
Good luck.

You said it Mike! My catheter was in for two full weeks and I still had these dreadful thoughts of the urethra being torn in two when they removed it.
Catheter Removal Day was fearful to the max!….all for nothing, of course…

Let me know how to follow your progress ! Best of luck

Seeing as I’m a gigantic nerd I likely will create a site for it, but until then I’ll post here.

I get my catheter out in ~40 hours or so, anxious for that. Suddenly my entire perineum is extremely sore - started in the middle of the night and has been really tender ever since. I attribute this to both healing as well as it has a big surgical tube running through it.

Otherwise, doing really well and it’s very hard to imagine that surgery was just 5 days ago. Already can walk a decent ways before my abs start to get too sore to justify further walking. I actually strapped on my leg bag and took four of the cars out for a bath, stopped at a local pub for some tacos and live music and had a pretty normal day except for having to empty my bag regularly.

Abnormally warm day here in Colorado, mid 60’s, so that’s shorts and T-shirt for us, so I put my leg bag on and disguised it with some ACE bandage wrap like I just had leg surgery or something, totally felt normal - and since I’m using a cane at the moment for extra support, nobody was any the wiser.

It was a good day today.

I’m curious to follow your progress as I feel I’m headed toward the decision of a RALP this year . I’m back in for a new PSA in April , currently at 16 however Gleason of 6 . Do you think there is significant incontinence with RALP or only on this site where more people with issues respond ??

I think the guys you are most likely to run into here are those that have issues or are gathering information. To that end, it seems - at least anecdotally - that more guys have some form of incontinence than do not. This is purely speculative based on my interactions here, and the level of incontinence varies greatly from occasional stress incontinence to full. For me, that was the one thing that I knew I had some small measure of control over and spent months preparing for in advance, we’ll see this Tuesday if that was useful as an immediate remedy or if my work pays off over time.

Since incontinence can impact either radiation treatment or RARP, I think that is something you are always likely to worry about, although my research indicates that long term incontinence is a very small percentage of men overall - regardless of treatment choice.

The single best thing that you can do to help yourself is to work on mastering your pelvic floor, because that is how you will control your bladder going forward. Essentially we take away the extra sphincters that we are given over women to control our bladder and now use the same single mechanism as they do and it takes getting used to and strengthening muscles we never had to worry much about before.

Then again, I’ve read plenty of stories of guys that never had a single dribble of a leak, from the day the catheter was removed - and that’s the goal I’m shooting for.

I agree with Survivor5280's comments.
I have been fortunate and most grateful to have been continent since surgery at age 72.
Best wishes for your health.