Gee Whiz, guys and gals, thanks for all the encouragement. As you can see, I made it though to the other side. The surgery went well, with a few surprises, but good ones. The doc said my prostate was the largest he had ever removed. He had to make a larger incision and do much more cutting of the supporting structures, plus I did get a right inguinal (sp) hernia repair, which has made it 3 times as sore. lol Good news was the urether and the bladder neck matched prefectly and was stitched easily, with what he hoped was little likehood of strictures later. Also, he said the external spincter was already closing and trying to control the flow of urine while they were still stitching it onto the bladder neck. The kegels and stairs must have done some good...Unless he is blowing smoke, I have an excellant chance at full recovery of function. My recovery will be a little longer and more painful than I/we expectedf, but that's ok. The removed gland showed no sign of breaking through, was smooth and still healthy looking, albit hugh size. He said it was the size of a small orange, rather than the normal walnut. I forgot to get the cc size of it. Ultrasound at biopsy was 76cc. If I gotta suffer, then I want the record...lol Maybe it will be in the Pathology report, which I should get Friday or Monday. The lymph nodes and seminal vessels appeared not to have anything unusual on them. He removed the ones in the cavity. One thing I hadn't read about
, maybe it's because mine was bigger, was gravity is a bad law in this case, as standing up allows things to drop down into what was an filled cavity, but now is
open, raw and freshly cut. That makes for some awesome pain. He also speculated that because of it's size, it had maybe stretched the nerve bundles, because when he began the removel the bundles just fell away from the gland and he had to do little touching or moving of the nerve bundles. If he isn't blowing smoke, I will be super pleased with that aspect of it. lol He said if I had gone to Vanderbilt, if they would had taken me because of the size, I would still have had to have theconventional cutting, but would have been 300 miles away from home and still cut
open. He says that if we are in pain we aren't healing as fast, so is making me take my pain medicines for pain and bladder spasms.
I haven't ever been much to fight pain to be macho man, so I am pleased with the Percocet. My wife is happily taking care of me, as she finally has something that she can do in my care, rather than just waiting. She is much relieved, as I am. I will post further details in my Journey section later... For now I am waiting for the path report Friday or Monday and the removal of the catheter Friday week (10 days).. Again, thanks for the concern, prayers and love that that was given to a stranger by bunch of stranger bound only by our shared disease..
Post Edited (James C.) : 8/9/2012 5:42:11 PM (GMT-6)