Frequent urination before and after

Before my PCa Dx, I mentioned "frequent urination" as an issue to my urologist. They did an ultra sound before and after peeing. It showed that that I had retained ~120 ml of urine in my bladder after peeing. We knew my prostate was enlarged and attributed the urinary retention to that.

Now, many months later, and post robotic surgery, (4 wks), i still feel like I need to urinate every couple of hours.

I am thinking that the two frequent urination issues are unrelated since I no longer have a prostate. Is this something that improves with time? Is this just a matter of retraining or should I ask at my 6 wk checkup? Is this something that Flowmax would help? I took that prior to surgery, and the subject has not come up again. Thanks!

Paul

I think this is fairly normal. If your like me, I was amazed at how quickly the bag filled while I still had the cath in. Once out you likely had or have at least some dribbling issues to deal with, so your focus is on this more than ever before. I was dry within just a few weeks, but I found I was going a lot more, and some of it I think was because I was concerned trying to hold out too long might result in some unexpected leakage. I can go hours no problem now, and sleep straight through the night, well perhaps not if the evening included some cold beers

Thanks guys for your encouraging words. This week has taught me to be patient with myself. I am fine all night long, but during the day, I go every hour and find that I am not peeing that much, so I am probably being cautious. I am doing fine without the pads, just a drop here or there. I think it was a good idea to try a day without the pads at home first to give me the confidence that I needed. Thanks again. Love this forum!

BrokenCrotch said...
Thanks guys for your encouraging words. This week has taught me to be patient with myself. I am fine all night long, but during the day, I go every hour and find that I am not peeing that much, so I am probably being cautious. I am doing fine without the pads, just a drop here or there. I think it was a good idea to try a day without the pads at home first to give me the confidence that I needed. Thanks again. Love this forum!

With that extra info now supplied, I am going to declare that you have it made, so you might as well stop worrying. First, no pads at 4 weeks, with just a drop here and there? That puts you near the top of the class, at least a grade of B+ or A. It took me most of a year to reach that stage, and on a trip to Europe with my wife at 3 or 4 months out I was really miserable, constantly searching for hard to find bathrooms. One of the heavy pads would usually get me through the tour day(I had some more in my pack for changes if needed) since I was sitting on a bus more than standing/walking, but it would be very wet and heavy by the end of the day, even with me needing to very urgently go every hour or two if I could find a bathroom. You are already way ahead of that at one month. Did you come here to brag? (Just joking)

For a final word of encouragement, you are "fine all night long". So was I, dry at night from the get go. But at my 6 week (7 actually) checkup, as I was expressing great dismay with my incontinence, my surgeon, the extremely highly published department chairman for a high volume nationally known RP center, told me that the single biggest predictor of final full continence some day was being dry at night from the get go. Which I was. That, along with he said I would probably take longer because I had a really huge prostate, and folks with that usually take a lot longer, but with just as good an outcome on average, down the road. So that gave me a lot of hope as it dragged on and on.

I don't think I have yet reached( at 20 months out ) what I would call full continence, but I have reached about where you are now pad wise(a few drops at worst) but with almost zero urgency for quite a while now. You are not only dry at night from the beginning, but(unlike me at almost a year) are already without a pad at 4 weeks and mostly OK, so I would say you have it made, most likely. I would say this is something you should not waste any more energy worrying about, though it is impossible to say if it will take a couple of weeks or several more months for that need to urinate frequently to finally go away. Just my opinion, of course.

Post Edited (BillyBob@388) : 10/10/2015 9:54:04 AM (GMT-6)