hi gary - i will extend this invitation to you and everyone else.  i do
not mind discussing this in private because of the sensitivity of how
personal it is.  this is one of those subjects where other folks have
the same problem, but are afraid to say anything to anyone else, because
they think they are the oddball.  that is not true.  i've found that
there are a lot of people like myself who got put into this boat.  i
didn't realize that the folks at this newsgroup were getting putting on
the same boat, but for a different reason.  

maybe these treatments for BPH have a higher incident of orgasm
causalities but unless we speak out, nobody will know.

let me say this for the sake of putting some peace of mind with
everyone.  the erections nerves and the orgasm nerves travel along two
separate routes.  they told me that i could still have orgasms, and that
i would "feel" the sensations, but nothing else would happen because all
the plumbing would be gone.  what they didn't tell me is the quality of
the sensations would be gone and it wasn't until i hit my surgeon with
point blank questions, did i find out the rest of the story.  and that
is what you guys are saying here, basically, the same story, but for a
different reason.  

as i've said in the previous post, i've learned to regain most of what
i've lost.  i feel that it can be done, but i couldn't put in a
newsgroup post.  

i hope this information has helped.

~ curtis

knowledge is power - growing old is mandatory - growing wise is optional

hi mel - no problem.  i don't mind discussing all this.  in fact, i feel
like this part of our lives is what gets us into trouble.

i'm a vietnam vet.  i've been as healthy as a horse all my life.  no
hospitals, surgeries, nothing.  as i was aging, i was noticing the usual
aging problems, the knee joints giving out, the aches and pains and
getting around, but still stayed active.  

in the sexual dept, i didn't notice much difference with the exception
of the amount and force, but there is a little thing called,  "male
menopause" that we don't know that much about.  if you do a google on
it, you should turn up something on it.  but it tells how a man will not
sleep as well as they age, that they will start getting up at night,
that the force and amount of ejaculate would be reduced (really it is
due to the reduction in testosterone)  you see, testosterone causes
muscle mass.  remember the weigh builders who want to bulk up with the
shots?  and when you were a child and became and man, the testes kicked
in and you got muscles.  well, it's going to other way, the hormone is
waning and the amount of fluid is going down and the muscle group that
causes the ejaculation process is getting weaker, etc, etc.  

so, i hadn't had a check up in a few years and thought i better pull in
to the old doc and have him raise the hood and check the oil.  they took
my blood and i flunked four out of five blood tests.  whoa!!!!   what
the hell???   and one of them was the psa test.  got myself a 5.79   the
first thing they did was put me on an antibiotic and checked me in two
weeks.  came back 4.8.  hey, that's looking a lot better, but they said,
no, they wanted me to go see  the uro man.  so, off to the uro i go.  
he looked at my records, my butt, my prostate, and my family history,
and sat down and told me, "you've got a 25% chance of having prostate
cancer right now.  we are going to pull a psa today and if it comes back
3.99999999999999999, then we won't do anything, but if it comes back
4.000000000000, then we are going to do a biopsy."  they pulled the
psa.....came back 6.35.   holy sh.t!!!!!!!

well, got the probe in the butt trick and that was an experience.  you
are laying on your side and can't see what they are doing and the
surgeon is calling people you've never met - to look at all this  and
you aren't invited.  and the surgeon is saying such phrases as, "see how
clear and define that is"   and "see how black and white that is"   now,
that makes you wonder all the while this is going on.  so, when he got
done firing those needles and getting the samples, i ask him if he saw
anything.  

now, let me stop here for a second.  he and i have hit it off pretty
good and he knows that my knowledge is pretty deep in this area as well
as my background, so he wasn't trying to stone wall me.

now, back to the question.  when i ask him about what he saw, he said i
was full of prostate stones.  hell, i didn't even know that much about
prostate stones.  he said, "sure, let me get some pictures for you" and
with that, he went over and ran off four photos of my prostate taken at
various angles.  he took the time to explain what direction he was
looking at and you could see the prostate stones quite easily.  i've
still got the photos.  don't know if i will frame them though.

after 3 weeks of pacing the floor i get to meet with the surgeon for the
news.  1/3 of the cores came back positive with prostate cancer.  given
the stage of T1c, a gleason score of 6 (3 + 3)  i'm half way shocked,
but not totally losing it.  i thought i could explain away the psa
reading by the infection and the BPH.  he said i was a good candidate
for surgery, but he could arrange the meeting with radiology if i
wanted.  

i asked him how long would i live if i did watchful waiting?   he looked
at my records and said, "you will not see 70 and the last three years
will be in pain."   i knew he was right because i walked my dad all the
way through to the end.  

so, in the next month, i did my homework and research, research,
research and kicked around the options with surgery always coming out
the on top.  i didn't want it but the facts were there.  so, i opted for
surgery with nerve sparing.  

the surgery was a piece of cake.  hardly any pain, the waiting for the
surgery was the bitch and i mean it is any sense of the word.  to lay
there and wonder at night.  the not knowing.  afterwards, you are so
relieved to know it is out of you.  

the path report came back.  all gland contained, negative margins -
meaning the cancer didn't get out.  reconnective tissue was clear of
cancer.  so all i had to do was heal.

erections came back before the catheter was pulled out 22 days later.  

i'm 10 months post op now.  still leak a little, but either i've
accepted it or it's not a big deal.  normally, i don't have to wear any
pads now.  

i did have complications.  6 months worth.  i scarred up from where they
sewed everything back together.  the first surgery after my RRP was with
the cystoscopy and to dilatation of the scar tissue.   boy, that hurt
worst than the surgery itself.  less than two weeks later, i'm down to a
dribble.  this time, the surgeon tells me he's going to do a TURP and
that it will take about 20 minutes to do.  now, i'm have been getting no
more than 90 minutes of rest at any time - day or night for 6 months.
and i have gotten up as much as 16 times to go to the bathroom in  a
period of 90 minutes.  as soon as my bladder starts filling up, it is
all or nothing.  i'm like that gotta go, gotta go commercial.  

so, when he did the TURP, i got on the operation table at 10am and was
put into the recovery room at 12:30.   when the surgeon came by, he
asked me how i was feeling and we told a couple of jokes to each other.
then i said, "hey! you said it would be about 20 minutes and here it is
2 and half hours later.  is there something i need to know?"   he
laughed and said, "how long does it take a sniper with one bullet to do
the job?  the rest of the time was set up time."  

well, anyway, since then, i'm back to normal.  my bladder fills up and
feels like it do before cancer,  i pee like a race horse, and i getting
my energy back.   i would say i'm 99% back to where i was only without
the cancer.  

now here's the scary part........ my prostate weighed in on the path at
55 grams and had pushed ring into the floor of my bladder.  the surgery
took care of that problem, but they said when they got in there, there
was a piece of BPH growth tissue that had grown out of the prostate and
pushing into the bladder and was forming a flapper valve over the urine
output of the bladder itself.  in other words, total shutdown.  he said,
"you were going to see us, one way or the other, but it's all taken care
of now."

i have no treatments to take and all they are doing is the taking of
blood every six months to make sure it comes back as undetectable.

so, that's my story and i'm sticking to it.  would i do again, given
everything i've went through?   in a heartbeat and with no reservations.  

right now, my life is bright and there's a sunrise, where there was a
sunset.  all of this was nothing more than a speed bump in the road of
life.  i've got a whole of lot of living to do.

i hope this will provide answers to some of your questions.  

my advice......take a close watch on your prostate.  if you notice
changes, don't take them lightly.  and watch that psa reading.  if you
get a .75 rise in a one year period, that is a warning sign.  so if you
have a psa of 1.5 and it jumps to 2.7, that is telling you something
even though they are using 4.0 as a cutoff point.

i want to  wish everyone low psa's

~ curtis

knowledge is power - growing old is mandatory - growing wise is optional