Pee Log.

@jayhall @survivor5280
I have had an increase lately in my frequency, urgency, etc.

A suggestion some time back was to urinate before you really have urgency. So I started doing that. Then I read like survivor5280 the bladder can learn when to signal the need to void based on how your habits and activity. Maybe also how much it says to go with amount of urine in bladder as well.

I think that happened to me and the bladder guy is just reminding me of my timing and amount of urine to signal need to go.

In my younger days I would pee a couple of cups of urine each time. Much much less often. Now it seems to be about a cup each time and many many times a day and night.

Now my first pee of the morning takes 10 minutes. That's not exaggerating; I've timed it.
Last week I had HDR brachytherapy, and you might say my bladder is pissed off.

@bluegill
Good pun!

It used to be a joke: the guy who was so dumb he stayed up all night studying for a urine test.

Now it's not so funny.

I barely passed a recent test, and all I had to do was pee into a urinal. Piece of cake, right?

After the first session of HDR brachytherapy, it took me two hours to pass the test, even though they had poured lots of liquid into me through my catheter before removing it. The medical staff were patient with me, and they tried almost everything: playing relaxing music, turning on the water in the sink, having me smell essential peppermint oil, and offering words of encouragement. Finally, I peed enough to earn the right to leave the facility without a catheter.

The second time, a week later (Achy-Brachy part 2), I had done my homework. The mistake I had made the first time was not taking my Flomax the morning before the procedure. So, the second time, with just the minimal sips of water, I had taken a Flomax, so I had more of it in my system when it came time to perform the urinal extravaganza.

Every day now I'm getting better at peeing, at least during the day. The nights are still challenging.

@jayhall
Like most say here, number of times a day depends on how much fluid one drinks a day. In the first 4 weeks after catheter removal I drank 80 oz of water a day and I went about 14 times on average.
I still drink about 64oz a day and maybe pee 8 or 9 times. Most nights I get up once around 1am to pee. It all depends on how we drink is my experience. I’d suggest to keep a log of daily activities for a month and see how it goes. I looked up my logs for this post.

HDR causes a LOT of swelling/inflammation. Not surprising what you are going thru.
A friend needed to up his dosage of Flomax during SBRT. Made a big difference!
Phil

Reducing my consumption of dairy and caffeine has helped me reduce the number of times in a day I urinate.

I had a bit of an epiphany moment in discussions with my urologist about my prostate surgery and the incontinence that followed. My assumption and complaint was that it must have been an enlarged, cancerous prostate that suddenly had me getting up at night to pee about 9 months ago (7 months prior to my surgery). I spent 40 years in my health care career and never knew the following that my urologist told me: as men age, their bladders get "smaller"...they can't hold as much urine, and THAT is why we get up to pee at night. In all my years in health care, I had never heard or learned that. He told me that my prostate was the normal size "for a man my age", but that I did not have BPH or prostate cancer-associated enlargement or functionality issues that caused the night time trips to the bathroom. He just laughed and said: "welcome to old age, your bladder is shrinking."
As an aside per this discussion string, I too have just started Pelvic Floor Physical Therapy (PFPT). My second session will be Friday, and I too am keeping just a one-day, 24-hour log of my urinary pattern. I document what I ate and drank, when and how much I pee'd; if there was leakage (when and how much) in between mentally scheduled or necessary trips to the bathroom, and how many pee-pads/diapers I went through in that 24 hours. I guess the Physical Therapist (PT) will know how to analyze the data. And...
I also learned that my urologist's post-op instructions and Kegel exercise instructions were all WRONG. My PT quietly shook her head when I told her how I was doing my Kegel's per the urologist's instruction sheet. One such instruction was when you stand to urinate, to consciously stop of the flow of urine, count to 5 seconds, then resume urinating, then repeat for as long as you are peeing. My PT nearly shouted "NO!" She said there is a strong cognitive feature to urinating and regaining continence. She said "you're messing with your brain...confusing it...when you play that start/stop/start/stop peeing. Your BRAIN gave you the signal to urinate, but you are stopping it, then starting it, then stopping it, etc. You are training your brain NOT to recognize and have you respond to urinate. You are training your brain NOT to urinate when you do that start/stop/start/stop game." It made perfect sense to me. I do Kegel's of a completely different type and do them twice daily laying down.
And one other offering:
In the beginning...the first 4-6 weeks post catheter removal...whenever I left my house to do errands, I KNEW I was going to leak and dribble (or more), so I put a Depends "pad" inside my Depends "diaper" to absorb what would have been a lot of urine if I was out 1-2 hours doing errands. It is always particularly bad when I stand up as I get out of my car...a flood of urine flowed. I realized that the extra pad was MAKING me pee MORE. There is only "so much space" down there. The diaper is comfortable to wear, but I could not discreetly carry another one if I soaked the first one, so I inserted the "pad" inside. I could easily carry an extra pad in my pocket. BUT...the extra thickness of the pad pushed up, somewhat uncomfortably, on my perineum, and in doing so, pushed up on my bladder that was slowly filling with urine. I was limiting the amount that my bladder could fill and expand before it would tell me it is time to urinate. So...with no space for the bladder to expand, the urine just flowed out of me into the pad. This went on until my perineum really started to ache from the "crowded conditions" down there. So...I started to go out with only a diaper on...and "fingers crossed." I DID NOT PEE, other than just a little dribble in the newly two hours that I was on errands. I also made the correlation that I only "leaked/pee'd" when I was not at home, because when at home, I only wear the diaper...it is much more comfortable (less "crowded" down there). It was a simple conclusion thereafter, that the extra pad inside the diaper was my problem...I was "making myself pee", when I wouldn't have, had I just worn the diaper alone, while out of the house. This has improved my outlook and hope that I just might be one of the lucky 66% of men who regain their continence within 2-3 months post-catheter removal. I am just now at two months (8 weeks), with a month to go. "Fingers crossed" that my new awareness to wear the diaper only, will lead to better control, fewer/no accidents or leakage. Maybe then I will regain my sanity from this exasperating new reality of incontinence. BTW - sorry for the thesis length here guys.

Oh yeah, I know it well. Life centered around peeing. Not much during the night,
once or twice. All day long is the real pain. thematrix made a good point, depends on
how liquid is consumed. When I drink lots of water, 25 or more times a day. Bladder shrinkage,
AND other things. Urologist always has the same response. "Wow, your the first person
I've seen with this". ((bs)))