I'm not following. Bladder cancer == tumor in bladder. Where is the confusion? Be glad the hospital responded so rapidly.

My apology to Coach for the brief thread hijack.

 

Congratulations! Funny thing, just the other day I was wondering how you where making out with your treatments. Glade to hear your through it! Now you can get back on your 65, and enjoy a good long life going forward!

I don't know how they work it where you had your radiation treatments, but my urologist's radiation center had a bell in the lobby, and when you completed your last treatment, you ring the bell on the way out the door. Everybody in the lobby waiting for their treatment, and all the staff applaud when you ring that bell, and it's a Hell of a great feeling to hear that bell, hear the applause, and to walk out that door for the last time!

 

Glad to see you are hanging tough .

 

Modern day medicine is pretty amazing. We all need to be thankful for for what is available to us when these things rear their ugly heads.

Lord, thanks 🙏 for todays’ technology and the medics that look out for us!!!

Have a great Sunday

 

Small tumor near the prostate but it didn't penetrate the various layers of the bladder wall, stage 1 cancer was confirmed after the tumor was removed.

 

That sounds very standard for early stage bladder cancer. Congratulations on beating it.

 

Its been a challenge. What they make sound easy is prepping for treatments. Not easy but doable.

The tough part now is dealing with the hormone injections. Small price to pay.

 

Yep


A great feeling of accomplishment for sure.

 

Coach, I've been following this in the wings, but didn't want to chime in until I heard your outcome. I went through this and it was a long haul. lots of tests and crazy PSA numbers. Dr was perplexed after 3 biopsies and an MRI with conflicting results that didn't match the PSA's...we watched it for 2 years, and finally I had enough and went for the 2nd opinion. All through this I never had a single symptom of any kind, which made it even tougher for me to stick with it, But I'm lucky I had an insistent wife that pushed me to keep going.
After a new type MRI that saw a lesion, and follow up biopsy, that followed the MRI scan to the lesion, and lots of talk with the doc, it was mutually determined that it needed to come out. At the time, they thought it was 5-10% cancerous...It was now the beginning of Covid, which caused several delays, finally Feb.23, 2021 I went in for surgery, a few hours later I wake up to the Dr. holding my hand to personally tell me that the surgery was unsuccessful due to the robot malfunctioning. I was of course devastated, and honostly, so was he, (No I didn't sue, My son's an Attorney, and no one did anything wrong) The Dr. and staff were in touch with us constantly, he even offered to go with me to any other Dr , if I wasn't comfortable with him doing it any more. I stuck with him, it just felt right.

I had to heal up for 5 weeks just so we could do it again. April 8th I went back, it was a 7 hour surgery, as they found out it wasn't the 5-10% they thought, but 45%, and big enough to push into the bladder. they had to keep checking the walls of the bladder to make sure it hadn't spread, fortunately it hadn't, I was lucky.

I ended up with a 3 day stay, and you know first hand what the next few weeks were like. My biggest concern at this point was continence. Keegle exercises were the key to success. Fortunately, I have a great outcome, my PSA remains at 0.01, and he has now moved me to 6 mos. testing from 3. I'm back to work climbing utility poles, golfing, and just plain grateful to be upright and moving forward.

I told you all this to let you know that your not alone in this, it gets better as long as you stay positive and keep fighting.
Go tell your story it might help another guy going through this. A Dr. once told me, that if men would talk more and tell each other what's going on, we would be much healthier, just look at the woman, they tell each other everything, that's probably why most out live us.

Best of luck in your recovery, stay strong and be proactive!!
God Bless..

 

Oaker, your words offer encouragement and inspiration to share my story. An old Dr once told me to be proactive and follow my PSA numbers closely. I started having these tests once a year. The rests stayed below 1.0 from when I was 55. Then very slowly crept above 1. by 65. Then I noted the small increases to my primary care Dr who blew me off since my numbers weren't over 4.0. I demanded a referral to a urologist. He felt around commenting a biopsy is in order. The results were alarming as he would have expected my psa number to be a 20.

Fast forward to present. I'm recovering from radiation and feeling pretty good. Especially since wifey and i stood up to some of the Drs bullshit, and always went for a second opinion. Thats the best advise I have to offer..

 

Good for you Coach, you have to push these guys some time...By the time they took mine out, the PSA had reached a 23....With still no symptoms that I could tell... Even after all I went through, I was lucky to not need any radiation, as of yet...But if my number goes up at all, I most likely will have to. My next PSA is in late February, so I keep my fingers crossed. Stay well sir... And feel free to reach out any time you need to talk about it....
Regards,
Mark

 

Its been a while since I last surfaced.

Radiation DONE
Two years of hormone injections DONE
Two plus years of Zitiga pill form chemo DONE
Now I wait. . . PSA tests every 90 days

After effects, sense of smell and taste gone.
Forgetfulness
Blood pressure problems and meds
Sensitivities
Joint and bone aches
And a host of other issues that fall under TMI
Hey, I'm alive and fairly healthy

Need to get enthused about a C2, again.

 

Wishing you the best of luck in your healing journey,

 

I find my projects are great distractions. Sometimes a good distraction is just what the doctor ordered.

Glad to hear you are on the mend!

 

Welcome back!

 

Yes, welcome back, JRC. Nice to see you posting again, and good to hear you're doing as well as you are. It sounds as though it's been a long, hard battle, but you've been hanging tough throughout. Congrats on the great progress.



Live well,

SJW

 

Congratulations,Sir……. You’ve had a tough row to hoe. Glad you’re at the end of that row!

Now get back out to the garage and concentrate on yur ride…….

 

Any day you're on top of the lawn, instead of under it, is a good day. My fingernails and teeth really suffered from my chemo. I've had 6 implants since stopping 2+ years ago and I'd like to be done with that. Fingernails slowly going back to normal, but still chip on the ends whenever I work on the cars or other projects. Sense of taste changed, but came back. Your forgetfulness will change too.....it's called chemo brain. In fact I didn't realize just how affected I was, but it changed my "normal" daily life and awareness, but after a year or so and several epiphanies of "wow, I'm thinking more clearly than last week or month or ?? and I feel physically better". It just takes time, but you will return to a better normal.

I don't know your age, but I'm in my mid-70's and that makes a difference too. I think Ben Franklin said "never put off until tomorrow, that which you can do today". It applies to all ages, but it really hit the mark for seniors. If you feel mentally and physically able to do something today, don't put it off, because tomorrow you might not be able to do it. It can takes weeks to do something you used to be able to accomplish in a weekend. Such is life.

 

You've been through a lot, Steve! Good on you for staying strong and fighting this awful disease.

I want to personally thank you for posting your journey. In an update to my post numbers 29 and 54 on this thread, I was diagnosed with Prostate Cancer earlier this year. I had 5 tumors but, because I get PSA tests every year, they were still localized making my cure very easy. My doctor did a HIFU (High Intensity Focused Ultrasound) procedure to remove the Cancers. The surgery took two hours and I went home the same day with no chemo, no radiation, and no cutting. On my first 90 day follow-up my PSA was 0.31 which is incredibly low.

So, I was lucky and my gratitude goes out to you, Steve, for sharing your experience and giving me the inspiration to keep getting those PSA tests, even though I had so many false positives, so many I had given some thought to stop getting tested.

The rest of you guys need to get that PSA test and repeat it every year. My PSA test was normal in 2022. One year later I had 5 tumors so you need to get on schedule to get this test every year.

You don't need to have a Urologist for this. Your primary care physician can get this done for you. It's just a simple blood draw.

BTW, if you're middle age or older and your doctor hasn't recommended that you get a PSA screening, you need a new doctor.

Good health to all,
Steve

 

Congratulations are in order. And some motivation.