HORMONE TREATMENT SIDE EFFECTS

Hi.  I started Bicalutamide on the day I was diagnosed (Stage 3, 'locally advanced' and aggressive, with a Gleason of 9 (4/5)) 2 days before Christmas.  I had the implant about 4 weeks ago.  Yer, OK, I get hot flushes, although I'd describe them more as 'inconvenient' than  'troublesome'.  They never seem to come when I'm somewhere cold though - ha! ha!.  I'm not sure if the feeling suddenly exhausted  and being generally running on reduced power throughout the day and then having trouble sleeping at night is to do with the hormones or, the cancer as it started a couple of months before I went to the doc's with 'waterworks' symptoms.  I've been determined to keep up my activities, despite feeling that I'm running on reduced power.  I cut out caffeine after midday and stay off my phone and don't watch telly (apparently, this is known as 'blue light'), at least an hour before going to bed.  However, it's clear that, isn't the issue because, there's very little difference. and i still can't get back to sleep easily, after the (frequent) get up's for a pee.  The GP was completely useless and after me telling him what i do - the stuff i mentioned above - he told me to 'cut back on the caffeine, avoid 'blue light' before bed - D'oh! (a rolling eyes emoji would come in handy here).  I very much don't want drugs like Amitriptyline or Zopiclone because, those drug types can lead to a physical dependency and a reduced effectiveness so, I suggested Melatonin,  but, despite loads of clinical tests worldwide, showing that this is not just effective to help with sleep problems, it is used to help prevent dementia (and at my age, that would be useful!) plus, with hardly any side effects, the Dr told me that NICE (Nasty institute for curtailing excellence) has deemed not to allow it to be prescribed on the NHS - so hang it all, I shouldn't have to but I buy my own and they work fine! - I don't have to take them every night and I wake up refreshed and can get back to sleep after the 'get-up to-go's'. OK, these are issues that I deal with daily but - they're manageable and despite what is written above, sounding like it, this really isn't a whinge or whine.

Thanks David