Post surgery incontinence

Sorry that you are still leaking. Please know that for some men it may take six months to a year or more to regain control. Stay strong! It may be worth the effort to find a physical therapist who specializes in kegel exercises. A lot of men (me included) initially did them wrong.

One think that worked for me was long distance (15 to 40 mile) bike rides. When I started I was leaking around 700 grams a day. I had to stop during the ride to change pads multiple times. After about a month or so I was down to less than 10 grams a day. My thought was the being on a bike seat for hours while wearing a pad helped exercise my lower pelvic muscles.

I hope that you find a solution that works for you.

Do four sets of 10. You may be fatiguing the muscle...
Who told you to do 100?

Jsw2son,

Update: Sorry, I read past the Physical Therapy bit in your posting. Most of this doesn't apply... The parts about a majority of men who leak at three months being dry at one year might still be interesting to you. You need to give things a bit more time before you look at other options. -- PeterDisAbelard

Has your doctor talked about physical therapy? Some sort of biofeedback/physical therapy is often offered to men who reach three or four months after surgery and don't seem to be making progress.

My biofeedback technician went over my Kegel exercise regimen with me and suggested some changes. Then I would visit her every week and she would hook me up to a gadget that connected to her laptop. On my end it was three EKG-type sticky electrodes on my lower belly and two more affixed to my "plumber's crack" area. She would then watch her display while I did a set of Kegels to measure the function of the various muscles in my pelvic floor. Apparently, some guys think they are doing Kegel exercises when they are really working their abs or their glutes. It's worth a visit or two just to be sure you are exercising the right muscles.

One of the ways this was helpful was that the machine would produce a numerical score for the strength of my efforts. That way we could see progress even though I hadn't yet reached the point where it would do much good with my leaking.

I have seen a couple of studies that show a benefit -- more men recover continence with than without the therapy. But it is a six-out-of-ten kind of deal. There are a few guys who never do get dry. Big Mac is one of them. I am another.

It is early days for you yet. Guys who are leaky at three months will be dry at one year more than half the time. Talk to your doctor about physical therapy and if you are still leaking nine months from now come back and we'll talk about slings (Worried Guy has one) and AUSes (Big Mac and Me and RobLee soon).

Oh, and Welcome to the Forum! Glad you found us but sorry you needed to look us up. Hope we can help.

I'm sorry that you have to be dealing with this unfortunate situation. Just for comparison, I had no control at all for about six weeks, and then there was a period of rapid improvement. I'm almost 8 months away from surgery and still have minor leaks and squirts. For you to be three months from surgery with so little improvement is worrying. If I were in your position I would be trying to meet with new doctors to see what they have to say. As a friend of mine says, always get the best doctor! If you had 5 weeks of physical therapy that probably means you are doing the kegels correctly. You don't say where you live. Post that, and perhaps some of the folks here could suggest other doctors you could consult.

Wanted to say thanks to everyone that responded. Really appreciated.

tmichael said...
If I read one more post about the guy who was dry one week after surgery and pushing wood right after, I will scream.

I hear that... Amen!

tmichael said...
Had RALP 1/10/17. Nerves spAred, margins clear, only 55 years old. Do my kegals everyday, doc checked it out and said I was doing them correctly, very active running and walking and working.
Dry all night and sitting but standing and bending ( which Is a majority of the day) I squirt and I can't control it. Go thru 5-7 pads depending on how busy I am.

Doctor and others tell me to be patient. I thought I would be further along. Gets frustrating. No progress in ED even with using Pump 5x week. I am in reasonably good shape and had little issues before surgery. We just are in that group of slow healers I suppose.

Four months post-op you MAY be slow or you may be right where you are supposed to be. I think it was just after four months that my RO became concerned about delaying SRT. You don't list your pathology, but in my case, full continence was necessary to begin SRT. It was after six months plus two months of physical therapy (kegel training) that the AUS was recommended.

If you have all the time in the world... that is, no further treatment necessary, then don't give up. I've heard 9-10 months is not uncommon, with some guys continuing to heal and improve well beyond one year. Good luck!