And another week down

It's been an interesting week.

The fatigue is gone, the nausea is gone, and the other symptoms seem to each have their 'special day'. One day, I'll have a restricted urinary flow, the next . . . well, there's an analogy about a race horse in there somewhere. Use your imagination.

It's interesting. In a clinical sort of way.

The other side effects come and go. None of them are incapacitating. Just irritating. Well, and sometimes painful.

I'm also getting that feeling of 'sitting on a golf ball' that some patients have reported. That's okay, I don't like hard chairs. :)

I am very much looking forward to the next couple of months and slowly returning back to 'normal'. Whatever that is.

I had an appointment with my endocrinologist the other day. (For an unrelated condition - a Prolacinoma) I did not take the hormone therapy because this lovely little nugget I have in my noggin suppresses testosterone. I had been on bi-monthly injections until the diagnosis in April. Anyway, we were discussing when I could start the testosterone again because honestly - the side effects from the brachytherapy are irritating, but the lack of testosterone permeates every part of my life. It's kind of a double whammy.

It's not looking like he will be willing to start the treatments any time in the near future.

That sucks.

And I'm back.

Well, mostly back. :)

Firstly, let me say that if you ever need a medical procedure done, Swedish hospitals in Seattle are excellent facilities. They have their 'act' together so to speak. If you have been fortunate enough not to have experienced this first-hand, you don't know how rare of a quality this is in today's modern medicine.

The procedure went fine. Much like, "Okay Mr. Moore, we are going to give you the anesthetic . . . Wake up! All done!"

That's my kind of procedure.

I've been sore for the last few days, and some of the usual side-effects that one would expect, but nothing too terrible. My chief complaints would be fatigue and nausea. Hopefully that will clear now that I'm off the antibiotics and some other meds.

Now we play the waiting game.

I'll be able to go back to 'light' swimming in the next week or so. No lawn mowing (aw shucks) for the next month or so, along with no motorcycle riding, or any kind of jarring activities. Gotta make sure those 'seeds' don't dislodge until they have time to heal and set properly.

Not that those are issues at the moment. I'm still not feeling quite good enough to ride anyway.

But all-in-all I'm on the mend.

I'll keep you posted.

Tomorrow is D-Day.

By this time tomorrow I should be about to check into the hospital for my little procedure.

For those that are interested, this is a fairly good article explaining exactly what's going to happen.

http://www.rmg.md/cancers/prostate/seed-implant/brachytherapy.htm

My job in all of this is to show up, and lie still while they slip the IV in the vein.

Then it's off to sleepy town!

And then wake up again after it's over. As I understand, the going to sleep part is easy. But sometimes the 'wakey-wakey' part is a problem.

Various people over the last few days have asked me if I'm nervous or anxious about the procedure.

Not really. I suppose I could work myself into a tizzy be imagining every horrible outcome there could be. Running that scenario over and over in my head until I was a basket case.

No thank you. Been there. Done that.

You know, we harp on people for living in the past and missing out on the present. And I'm sure we all know someone like that. But living in the future is no better. Well, it is if you fantasize an ideal future, but how many of us do that? No, we run every possible situation we can imagine, trying to 'prepare'. But reality is never as we imagine. So why go there?

That's what causes worry and anxiety.

Here's a 'Davidism'. (Feel free to use it so long as you credit me as the originator. :)) Worry is nothing more than fantasizing failure. Think about that for a minute.

The best words regarding worrying, and ones that I've probably posted before, are from the Dali Llama. "If a problem is fixable, if a situation is such that you can do something about it, then there is no need to worry. If it's not fixable, then there is no help in worrying. There is no benefit in worrying whatsoever."

I've heard him condense this to: "If there is a problem, and you can do something about it - no worries. If there is a problem and there is nothing you can do about it - there is no reason to worry."

So there you are, and here I am.

I'll post more when I get back from the other side.

See you soon.