How long should I wait to decide??

It does feel good when you finally make the decision. Wishing you the best!!!

Steve n Dallas said...
Welcome to the site that no one wants to be a member of...

It's taken you 58 years to get to this point since prostate cancer is such a slow grower.

Not that you would want to put things off for "years," you have plenty of time to decide.

As a 62 year old who has put himself on active survalieence after my MRI. I think you put it all in perspective, thank you !

Congrats on making your decision. Oh what a relief it is, 1st milestone of many to come for you in the coming months.

Don't look back and second guest yourself now.

Now start to prepare for the fight, ex. eat better, loose some of those pounds you mentioned in your first post, start walking, exercise, learn Kegels for pelvic floor rehab after surgery. I dropped 20 lbs. before my surgery and another 9lbs. the week after.

Good luck, we'll be here for you.

Bill from Florida

Mule... based on your numbers your cancer's doubling time is 3 years. I, like you, was worried about speed of getting something done whatever that was going to be. I didn't really trust my uro, either, and had some contentious moments with him, so I sought a 2nd opinion from an oncologist who had a specific specialty in prostate cancer. He assured me over and over that the fact I'd waited a few months for a biopsy (because there was no way I could ever have cancer) wasn't detrimental to my living or dying. His opinion meshed with mine and I didn't tell him what I'd decided. He told me with my two cores of Gleason 7 (3+4) and PSA of 12.4 that I could choose surgery or radiation with hormone therapy. He did caution that if I tried radiation, first, that it would be unlikely I could have surgery later. He told me if I had surgery and it didn't work, radiation could be used as a follow up. The choice seemed clear to me. If I failed with radiation, I was cooked like my prostate so I felt it best to have it removed even though I was severely tempted to do active surveillance over the objections. He showed me this tool...

http://nomograms.mskcc.org/Prostate/index.aspx

My numbers were fed into the tool and it showed me I had a 64% chance of survival. If the cancer hadn't spread my numbers went up in to the 90's. I was oddly comforted by this. The key is and was and will be for you and all of us new patients a question of whether the cancer is/was confined to the prostate capsule. NOBODY could tell me that and told me only during surgery would that be determined and if any cancer was found anywhere else they would take it, immediately, they wouldn't wake me up and ask. :)

I had 3 positive cores. 2 were 3+4 cores...my 2nd opinion actually upgraded all 3 cores to 3+4. Ironically, the post op pathology showed my cancer to be a Gleason 6 which I've read is unusual as most removals show a higher Gleason than the biopsy showed. Being in the intermediate range you never know which way it's going to go. Your PSA's were much lower than mine. I was truly right there in the middle.

Our thoughts are with you. A difficult time in any man's life. Happy you made a decision. That is a tough thing to do. Hammer down and get it done. Say GOODBYE to cancer.





2 out of 3 is pretty good odds.