7 weeks after RARP, feeling frustrated, depressed, waiting to improve

@paulbwatertownct
You really are blessed to have a supportive wife!

I did not have RP just radiation and no ADT. I assume you have and area still taking ADT is that correct? The ADT drugs can cause a lot of side affects. These side affects need to be brought to the attention of your urologist. There are many things (drugs, physical therapy, etc) that can be done to help.

You mentioned PT so I assume this is addressing some of those issues. Do not hesitate to reach out to the mental health profession to help you through this. I did almost 10 years ago to deal with PTSD and anxiety/panic disorder. The counseling and medication I was put on drastically changed my mental health which had great impact on my physical health.

Many on MCC will post their experience with RP. But RP is a major surgery and with major surgery it is going to take time to heal both physically and mentally. I will not even attempt to compare getting a ICD/Pacemaker I got back in 2015 but I was told it would take about a year for me to recover from the surgery and stress caused by it.

I hope you have experienced medical professionals you are seeing. I would reach out to them and be honest with your side affects, your depression, your mental outlook. As you will see on MCC a persons response to RP is a personal response and what one will deal with, have a problem with, etc. is not what another will have. So do not think another poster can tell you what you will feel both physically or mentally it is specific to you and your experience along with your mental and physical health.

Reach out for assistance.

Take it slow, brother and DON’T expect to be anywhere near normal for months…
RARP is candy coated with all these feel good phrases like ‘robotic, ‘less invasive, ‘nerve sparing’…and they’re all true! - but only
relative to the old fashioned open type which was pretty brutal.
Don’t get frustrated by how long anything is taking to get back to normal. One thing you will hear on this forum over and over again is “we are all different“. And that holds true for urinary continence and return of sexual function in spades.
Just do whatever your therapist tells you to regain your urinary continence, take the daily Cialis and use a pump to maintain the integrity of your penile tissues. That’s all you can realistically do because whatever will be will be. If after doing everything you are told and you are still no better, then there are certain procedures you might have to look into to give you some relief but that’s a long way down the road.
Just keep your eye on the ball and realize that your insides have been completely rearranged and rerouted and it’s gonna take your nerves, muscles and tissues, a while to re-acclimate themselves.
Ironically, my wife just had her hip replaced at the best orthopedic hospital in the world. They made the procedure sound like a total cakewalk. Robotic, less invasive, quicker recovery…bullshit!! Two weeks out she’s still in pain and has trouble moving her leg at all. I keep trying to explain that this is normal considering she had the head of her femur saw off and all the giant thigh muscles cut! No matter how you sugarcoat this procedure It’s not much different from being T-boned by a drunk driver or attacked by Jason from Halloween…it’s brutal!
But like you, her expectations were set very high, so now she’s more frustrated than anything. I’m finding this is all too common nowadays, the way procedures are presented to us. We think all the high tech mumbo jumbo is gonna change the actual procedure, but all it does is make the surgeons job easier and get you out of the hospital faster – that’s it! Best of luck on your recovery!
Phil

patience. continence is s journey. took me 12 weeks to get to a reasonable level of continence. some are shorter, some longer. assume you are working with a pelvic floor therapist. if not, do so! you really need to commit.

ED is another story, but you need to keep working at it. "use ir or lose it". im on daily cialis, use the pump a couple times a week, take the trimix shots 2x a week. no real progress, but the trimix gets me hard like a teenager, so sex is definitely in play. i also have an ED therapist, who is great! use all the sprcialists you can!

as always, work with your doc/therapists to develop a plan and stick to it!

good luck!

Hang in there. The first few months after my RARP in 2015 were pretty brutal in terms of urinary incontinence. I finally got to using one or two pads per day. It was tolerable, but in 2023 I decided to have a urethral sling surgery (outpatient). Lots of post-surgical swelling and bruising, but I regained 100% urinary continence immediately. No more pads since then. My urologist put that option on the table right from the beginning and said it was there when and if I was ever ready for it. I wasn’t excited about doing yet another surgery, but man, looking back, I wish I had done it sooner.

Although it is too soon to have the surgeriesand your situation may still improve, you should maybe talk to your doctor about IPP and AUS (inflatable penile prosthesis and artificial urinary sphincter) implants. I got them and only wish I had gotten them sooner.

@jc76
Thanks for your thoughtful response and support. I’m not on ADT, so no side effects of that.

@heavyphil
Thanks for the response and advice. Most appreciated

@jimgaudette Going to meet with my doc about this in a couple months! Thanks for telling me this surgery even existed! Also happy all things "down there" are in working order for ya! 🙂

@mlabus3
Thx for the response and advice. No one from my medical team has yet talked to me about a pump or Trimix, I’ll look into that.

@melvinw
Interesting option, I was unaware. Thanks for your help.