Ron42661 said...
Please don't get me wrong or think I do not appreciate all of your input and support. I have looked at all the options and discussing with several doctors and other folks who have had similar situations. Surgery was the preferable option. The one thing that nobody would ever tell me or give any input was if I did nothing because in all opines it seemed idiotic given the general belief that it had been contained and one 8 score. how long will it take to run the inevitable course if ever? If I am hearing the possibility of it getting me in five years or 70% that it may never maybe it's worth the risk of doing nothing instead of going through this Excercise that "likely" will help but no guarantees I absolutely appreciate all your comments and appreciate that everyone's choices are those that are best for them. Rambling again. But I wanted to all to know your opinions are very helpful and appreciate them but am probably unsuccessfully portraying my view point. Thanks all
In response to my probaly panicked questions along the line of "what are the odds of this actually killing me before I die of something else:One thing my URO(not the one who actually did my surgery) said to me that really got my attention, and that we may not always consider: it is no picnic living with prostate cancer.
Now, that may sound like stating the obvious. But we often think only in terms of the actual death, which may not come for many years down the road even with no treatment. And in fact, even with an aggressive and advancing PC inside of us, no telling how many of us will die of heart attack or stroke or even some other far more aggressive cancer before the PCa can actually take us out. If that happens, we end up in the statistics of men who had PC but did not die of PC. But that does not mean we won the gamble against PC, hence his statement about
living with advancing PC being no picnic. He mentioned, for example, spread into the bladder. And of course the pain associated with spread into the bones. So he could or would not really tell me my odds of living maybe a long time even with an untreated high risk case. But as one who deals with lots of PC patients on a daily basis for many years, who could tell me that just because I lived a long life with aggressive PC and even died of a heart attack like most folks, that does not mean my long life was going to be a good one. And as much as I did not want treatment, I decided he might have a point. But to each his own.
Also, when you asked them "how long will it take to run the inevitable course if ever?", too bad they didn't at least give you an educated guess, what the statistics show. But I just keep in mind my friend, several years younger the me(now 68), who died several years ago of PC. He must have been early 60s. And I'm betting the last few years of his life- with or without treatment, I don't know his details- were not all that much fun. So the point is, it does kill some guys pretty quick, or quick enough. Others go along time but suffer from the disease before dying of something else. I guess there is a final group that, even though hi risk, make it quite a while, die of something else, and never even suffer from the PC. Which group will you be in?
Post Edited (BillyBob@388) : 9/13/2017 11:53:31 AM (GMT-6)