New Member, not a club I really wanted to join!

I am a 51 year old resident of Cape Cod who just had his second set of biopsies in the past 16 months.  My initial PSA at my yearly physical at age 50 was 3.7.  Given the normal antibiotic scrip and retested, still over 3.  First set of biopsies, 12 cores, all negative.  This year's physical indicated a rise in PSA to over 6.  Two different antibiotics and an additional Free PSA of 7.2 and 9% two months later.  Had the latest biopsies on Tuesday, awaiting results.

This forum has been a wealth of information and I have ordered Walsh's book and am actively looking at any information which will prepare me for whatever is found.  No prostate in family history, although older brother also has elevated PSA.  Another older brother died years ago of renal cancer and Dad had long bout with luekemia.  I'm in good shape having lost 65 pounds five years ago.  I am acitive, work out regularly and have a wonderful wife of 30 years.

Thank you all for your willingness to share, it has alleviated a lot of needless worry.

Many of the newly diagnosed folks end up dealing with , PCa of the indolant variety, and is more common than you may have guessed. If you are found with it and many men have it and don't ever know it for that matter. Nice example my brother (older than me like by 6-7 yrs), went in to check his psa because of my outrageous findings with PCa, well they found one sample with less than 5% and graded Gleason 6, his doc recommended surgery, my brother read alot and looked at alot and told the doc no way....and they both came to laugh it off as an immediate type protocol. So he monitors and was and is in no hurry.

That is coming up on year 6 now since then and no psa progression (it was 1.0 originally, DRE maybe felt something and lead to biopsies back then). So he is still A.S./W.W. or in effect not all that worried about it still, he almost forgets he has been detected with it. If you have PCa found, have those slides reviewed by one of the select experts like Bostwick, Epstein or Oppenheimer...that is worth the time and effort. Don't be rushed into anything, it probably took 10-15 years for PCa show up...low fPsa is likely to reveal something, we would guess.

FYI-another guy whom had psa of 11.0 and 2 positive cores (Gleason 6), no invasive proceedure used, 1996 diagnosed, took a shot(LOL) at doing ADT3 drugs for 13 months, then stay on proscar for maintenance, he has all normal manhood functions, rebiopsied a few times and nothing found. Not bad results for that many years, and he can still choose any protocol towards beating it, if an when he decides to. Could buy alot of time and who knows what vaccines or whatever will be out in 5-10 years or such.
Of course most people don't acknowledge this guys results, fine....he is a happy camper..fyi.

CCR:

wishing you all the best in your continuing journey...keep us posted !

bob

zen, i liked your post above, and its tone, you gave our new friend some good, sound advice.

however, i just didnt get your #4 point, perhaps i was reading too much into it, or took it too literally. nothing wrong with what you said, just trying to understand it.

david

Hi Purg!

I eliminated #4 from my earlier post. If it's confusing, better to eliminate it.

You and I both know that if he actually does have prostate cancer, he'll be confused soon enough!

Hope you're feeling better.

Zen9

Post Edited (Zen9) : 12/16/2010 7:25:32 PM (GMT-7)

Hi Cape Cod, you don't want to be here, and I assure you, I don't want you here either --- but, nevertheless, a warm welcome and I'm glad you found this place. As you noted there's lots of good support and information here. I'll be watching for more news. Thanks for posting and sorry your circumstances are such that you ever had to seek this place out.

Sheldon AKA Sleepless