Breathing and kegel exercises

I also see a pt that specializes in males following prostatectomy,. She is great and she probably figured out I was a slow learner. a clencher. I hold my breath all the time when I should not. She even used visuals with me, explaining how my diaphragm and abdominal muscles contracted and expanded .

I am very happy to hear that there are considerable improvements - they look small to you, but if you read your posts of couple of months back you will see that you have a nice trend now : ) . I am sure once they fix hernia that your incontinence recovery will have even faster trajectory (of course after initial post surgery recovery period ).

You are VERY active and have very minor leaking unless you make sudden moves and that will improve with time and exercise too : ) . Please, please do not even think about picking up your grand-kids - I know that it is fun but you have to take care of yourself until you fix that hernia. If there are toys on a floor ask 4 year old to pick them up ; ), they should learn about cleanup at that age anyways.

Regarding RARP - my husband will have surgery done mid August and I am a nervous wreck, but I am trying very hard not to show it, so I am featuring "Mona Lisa smile" 24/7 XP. Thanks for asking < 3.

I wish you good luck on your husband’s surgery. My prostatectomy is scheduled for September 2nd. I have pre-op next Monday. I am learning as much as I can on how to prepare for surgery, the week before, the day before, the day of, the morning after, home recovery etc. Based on the learnings, I am doing things I can do now ( e.g. starting kegel exercises, getting supplies, identifying potential home health resources near me etc.) which I hope will lead to a successful outcome.

Thank you very much Soli and I wish the same to you : )))
I think that you are doing great job with learning and preparing and I am sure that recovery will be much easier and faster because of that. All of this will hopefully soon be behind us and we will be able to concentrate on healing and going forward. : )

You are welcome @surftohealth88 .

I agree: at some point in the future, this will be all behind us. In addition, there maybe a silverlining for us to discover which - in my experience - always exists in every crisis. As a starter, the voiding disfunctions caused by an enlraged prostae will be gone, since the prostate will be gone. Granted the voiding disfunctions caused by the prostate will be replaced with incontinence, but for most people that will be temporary.

Will there be other silver linings?

Ha ! You got me with this one , ha ha.
I am usually trying hard to stay in "Pollyanna"/"Terminator" hybrid mode to survive any crises but when cancer is in question it is really hard to look for a silver lining - I do not see it, no matter how hard I look *sigh. For us there is none BUT who has time to think about that ; ), - big fight is ahead so "hasta la vista" Soli ; ) , and may we beat this thing once and for all : ))) ! 🍀🍀🍀

I hear you @surftohealth88 . Getting cancer is one of the worst things one can face. But I am a disciple of Yale Professor Dr. Laurie Santos who is an expert on Happiness. One of her important techings is - in facing difficult situatoin - one needs to "look for a silver lining". That is "to look for the positive aspects of a challenging situation". That is what I am trying to do. In fact, I have alread uncovered one major one. My primary doctor did not want to refer me to a cardiologist because she did not a see a reason to do so. But as part of the recent pre-op tests for surgery, a minor issue in its very early stage was discovered which I was not aware since there were no symptoms. This problem could have gotten progressively worse if I had not caught it in a very early stage as part of the surgery pre-op: I see this as a silver lining, and will continue to look for more. I am pretty confident I will find more since I have applied this principle to every horrible situation I have faced in the past. Clearly, none of this will change the terrifying cancer diagnosis, but it allows my mind to also focus on the positive aspects that are discovered.

I understand everyone faces challenges in their own respective ways: so I agree with the principle "to each his/her own."

Soli and surftohealth
I love it.
I am six months out, and it has been a trying six months but -- this is the big silver lining we are taking a big step to get rid of cancer. Decades ago, so many men just got cancer and did not live as long. Now, if we get early detection and then treatment, we stand a fair chance at good life expectancy.
I hope you and your husband surftohealth, get the surgery and then while recovering at least the PSA should be low. The catheter is not fun but it more or less short term, ( five days to two weeks it seems, I had a very conservative surgeon so I had it in for two weeks)
Incontinence and Ed ( and other less common things like infections, hernias, etc)
I wish my urologist had told me that the majority of men are incontinent and most take close to a year to get back to baseline (with lots of variance)/ I was told little and when I pressed I heard things like 'dome guys have no problem with incontinence," : some guys really turn a corner in a few weeks" "lots of guys go back to work in two weeks" I should have been shown the recommendations from the American Urological Association and told something like most men will have incontinence, it sucks but it is the price to pay to get rid of cancer expect a year of working on it and if it better then this then be pleasantly surprised.

Anyway, I want to know how both of you do in August ( your husband surftohealth)
IN my case it was a good decision, and I have no big regrets.

I am glad the worst is behind you and the cancer is eliminated. And hopefully your side effects will wane over time with exercises and therapies. I have heard from a lot of people who have had surgery that the degree and duration of incontinence is all over the map.
So, that is one of the big unknowns for me, and I have already started Kegel exercises even though my surgery is in early September. Hope that helps.

Will keep everyone posted after the surgery.

please keep us posted