4 days to go and it will be 7 Months!!

Sorry I’ve not updated for a while.  Sometimes life just seems to takeover.  I have recently had my PSA blood test (six months later than it should have been) on Tuesday and got the results yesterday.  The good news is that all is well and my levels are still at zero – PHEW!!!

5 ½ years after my open radical prostatectomy I am on annual checks.  Initially I was told it would be for 5 years however at my 4 year check I was informed that the criteria had changed and the annual checks would now be carried out for 10 years and instead of having them done at the hospital I was to be discharged and have them done via my local General Practitioner.

I don’t know how other people are when it comes to having their checks but for me – it goes way beyond scared!!  I have been very lucky as far as the Prostate Cancer goes.  Mine was caught early and the cancer was contained within my prostate meaning I had surgery and that was it, no radiotherapy or chemo mop-up.  However I am still just as frightened by the annual check as I was initially.  My way of coping was and is to have everything the same for each check, same date and place for the blood test, same place and if possible doctor for the results – you get the idea.  This time, 6 months late, blood test was at the same place, results over the telephone if I wanted otherwise they would only be in touch if there was a problem.  As you might guess – I phoned them!!  I just could not cope with waiting for a phone call that may or may not come.

For some reason within my make-up there is something that on occasion gives me a pretty much uncontrollable fear of cancer and since my diagnosis, illness in general.  When I was growing up in the 60/70’s it seemed to me from what I heard from my parents and others that a person got cancer and they died, simple as that.  My mother especially had the same fear as me, perhaps I inherited that fear, who knows.

Times have changed I know, medical knowledge, techniques and medicine in general has come so far in 40 years (even 5 years and less) that the prognosis for many people has changed and so many people go on to live normal lives.  For me, for some reason within me that knowledge does not stop the irrational fear that I get every time I have my check.

Talking of how far medical expertise has come – back to the main theme of the blog, my implant.

All is well and I am beyond happy with the result, as I have been all along.  While I was leading up to my annual check I really didn’t feel much like inflating twice a day as I had been.  In fact I was leaving it for 3 or 4 days at a time between.  The last couple of days I have been getting back to my normal twice a day inflation/deflation nut I have noticed a slight difference in the max inflation now, which has reduced slightly.  Saying that this morning the pump had more give in it again and I can once again feel the stretch.  Measuring, the girth is pretty much the same at 13cm as it always has been, the length has dropped slightly but only by a couple of mm and as I said I can already feel it stretching back.

Goes to show that I still need to be inflating a couple of times a day to get the maximum that I can in the future.

 

As always any questions please just ask.

All the best for now.

Dave