Hello everybody
I'm guessing this is the club none of us wanted to join, but here we all are!!
OK, so this is my first post on the Macmillan website so excuse any errors or typo's I make
A little about myself.
Following a short period where I couldn't urinate properly for 3 days, the wife began to notice. By day 4 I was fine again & thought I'm obviously OK now, problem solved. The wife was having none of it & made me go to the docs to get checked out, & under protest I went. I'm glad she bullied me into going now!
This is my story of how I got here...
I'm 56 & following a blood test that produced a PSA reading of 23 ng/ml, I was sent to York for an MRI scan.
Following the MRI, I then had the delight of undergoing a biopsy
The results from that came back& for all intent & purposes might as well have been written in latin, for what I understood of it.
However with the help of Dr Google & a couple of purchased books from Amazon, I'm beginning to educate myself as to what it all means
For information my condition is as follows
A volume prostate of 50ml, PSA density of 0.46ng/ml & a 1.4 lesion within the left posterolateral peripheral zone between mid gland & base. My overall likert score is 4.
My Gleason score is 7
There are also some bilateral pelvic side wall & external ileac chain nodes up to 8mm
I've been for a bone scan & this has shown negative for cancer spread to the bones.
I'm now on 50mg of Bicalutamide daily, & yesterday went for my first injection of Prostap
How do I feel?
This is the most scariest thing about the whole cancer episode - I feel absolutely fine. From what I know now, by the time some people realise they have prostate cancer it's spread itself all over the place & the level of poo you are in is significantly deeper!!
Touchwood, I've had no side effects from either the Bicalutamide of Prostap.
Since diagnosis, I've been absolutely hammering myself in the gym, I find it works wonders for my mental health on this matter. I leave the gym looking like a sack of poo.....but to be honest, I used to leave the gym looking like that before this cancer came along.
Mentally I'm quite calm about the whole thing & have the attitude of how very dare these cancer cells try to destroy me & my prostate, the bloody cheek of them!!!!
I've become a bit of cancer bore & I make sure everybody I know, knows about me. I find it quite therapeutic talking about my condition & it's not the elephant in the room whenever I turn up at work or out with my friends.
The other plus out it is that if I tell a hundred people about what's happening to me, & just one of them thinks I should get myself checked out, then it's been a good day
Thanks for reading
Dej
Hi Steve
No, the diet sheet was never offered to me either. One of the guys in the waiting room suggested I asked for one - I'm so glad I did.
The RT can irritate the bowel, so it's important not to eat or drink anything that will make things worse. Amongst other things, alcohol and anything high fibre is a no no. (That said, its important to eat a healthy diet).
Trust me, I ignored it at Christmas and very much regretted it! A couple of glasses of wine and a few sprouts really wasn't worth it!
Ask for it, if they don't offer it, as its best to know sooner rather than later.
Regards
Stuart
