Advice on a trip after having Radiation

graybeard,
the bowel irritation and increased demand to urinate was significant for me for about 3 weeks after my completion of radiation at Mayo. I had some 'fun' things planned but cancelled them before I finished treatment, and I'm glad I cancelled them. If your trip is refundable I'd give serious to putting it off for a few weeks.

With all the feedback I will cancel the trip , jet blue will not refund but give you a year to reschedule. Not worth the gamble, feeling very down after thinking the surgery removal would be the end of this , ow its like finding out I have cancer all over again, I’ll get through this but need a little time to mentally adjust to what lies ahead

Your decision to postpone makes sense to me.
And yes, persistent PSA post RP is a body blow. It was for me.
However, my PSA has been < .02 undetectable from 6 mos following completion of radiation to now (about 1 year of testing).
And my life returned to the ever-changing "normal" about the same time (6 mos following completion of Salvage Treatment).
Best wishes for successful treatment.

I saw where you cancelled the trip...

So, my experience is a little late in your decision making. I did SRT after experiencing BCR 28 months from a very successful surgery. It was 39 IMRT treatments to the prostate bed, no ADT.

I experienced no side effects. Same for the other two times I've done radiation.

When making decisions consider statistics, Bell Curve, average, mean....some will fall inside the Bell Curve or what I call the "normal" experience. Others will fall outside it, either experiencing definite side effects or not, I am the latter. Where you will be none of us can say, we can only relate our experience. There are statistics which will say for the population as a whole...information, but, may not be your experience!

I've also done chemotherapy once and ADT twice. While experiencing the usual side effects from those, they did not interfere with living. My wife and I travelled to Iceland, did the Ring Road, went to the coasts of Oregon and the Columbia River Valley while I was doing 12 months of Orgovyx....

The advances in the planning and delivery of radiation along with technological changes in the systems make it not our "fathers' experience."

There is also the training, education and experience of the radiation oncologist and their team that may be a factor. I've had the same radiologist for all 69, she's good.

The only constraints I faced with radiation were travel since only weekends were free but otherwise M-F you had to be physically present and the daily ritual of hydration, going to your appointment.

So, your decision, you have heard from a variety of guys on this forum and their experiences.

As to ADT, likely you have systemic PCa which may necessitate systemic therapy in conjunction with radiation.

You don't say if you've had imaging or not nor other clinical data such as pathology report which would be useful to the forum providing their thoughts.

I will say this, talk with your medical team about doublet or triplet therapy. If you and your medical team go the route of radiation discuss including the whole invoice lymph node system, not just the prostate bed.

Definitely talk with them about taking mono-therapy off the treatment menu, definitely not mainstream clinical practice.

If you have not already, find and read the NCCN guidelines for Advanced PCa, use it as a guide for discussion with your medical team.

Kevin

Kevin

My pet scan showed cancer in the seminal vesicle is all I know at present, I have a team of the top doctors in the Boston area so I’ll get through this but as an active 78 yr old I’m not very patient

Graybeard, It really is depressing to hear the news that “it” is back, especially after going thru surgery.
But you are going to meet SO MANY men during your radiation treatments who are going thru the same damn thing. Some 10 years post surgery! Makes you wonder why you bothered at all, until you realize that this is not a defeat - but a second chance to save your life.
My reason for having surgery was to HAVE the second chance, if needed. Yes, it’s annoying, time consuming, uncomfortable and inconvenient….and the radiation diet is no fun either.
But as I lay on that table for 25 days, every time the machine beeped, signaling the beginning of the actual radiation phase, I would say in a low voice, “Die, you motherf*****r, die!!” over and over….it made me dance out if there every single time!
Phil

Your comments and others are helpful, not being able to have sex for so long if ever makes this even harder, maybe I should have a sex change next , only kidding, but would like to be a hot lady in my next life

Well, that would take prostate cancer off the table.🙄
I have heard that the 6 inch heels are their own type of hell.😵‍💫

But then you have to worry about breast cancer from all the estrogen! Just can’t win!!🤯

@graybeard46, I see that you have cancelled your upcoming trip. But like @kujhawk1978, I hope travel will continue to be part of your future. When travelling, be sure to consider travel insurance and cancellation insurance, especially when travelling out of the country. You might be interested in this related discussion that @northoftheborder started a while back.

- Cancer and travel health insurance: What coverage do you get?
https://connect.mayoclinic.org/discussion/cancer-and-travel-health-insurance/