Possible Cancer diagnosis

Sorry to hear about your new experience. I hope you are referring to a urologist vs. oncologist. I would not want an oncologist doing a prostate biopsy unless they have special training and equipment.

There is nothing unusual about a PSA < 4 for 70 year old men but your recent rise makes it prudent to check out as suggested. The nodule felt makes it more reasonable to check it now. MRI should not be a problem unless you are claustrophobic then that has to be addressed.

One step at a time. The fear of the unknown is common but not really warranted. You don’t have prostate cancer until the doctor says so which requires that a pathologist looks at the cell structure under a microscope and until then, you are just an ordinary man with a prostate. Even if you do, there are many shades of grey from benign to high risk lesions where surveillance or treatment takes care of the problem for a long time. Be happy, a lot of men don’t make 72 so you are headed in the right direction.

Welcome to the Forum where no one wants to be, Athena#2. I don't know if this will help with your anxiety, but about 50% of nodules turn out to be benign. In my case a new nodule that my uro felt plus a PSA increase slightly higher than expected from my long-standing BPH prompted my umpteenth biopsy. The ironical good news: the nodule was negative (yeah!); the bad news: cores taken in two other prostate zones revealed high-grade cancer that required treatment. That treatment was successful.

Your upcoming MRI may or may not reveal suspicious spots. Even if the MRI is negative, given your PSA history, I'm fairly sure your uro will want the biopsy: all prostate zones need to be sampled, with extra cores taken in any targets that the MRI identifies.

Stay positive! If your biopsy does reveal cancer, you will take the appropriate steps (active surveillance or treatment, depending on the amount/severity/location). It may seem difficult, but we do learn to take one step at a time! Prostate cancer (PCa) often turns out to be indolent, not requiring immediate treatment and sometimes never requiring treatment. Many cases of PCa that do require treatment are confined to the prostate, so treatment lets you put the cancer in the rearview mirror and get on with your life.

We are here for you if you need us, and can answer some of your questions as they might arise. We aren't doctors, but there is a great deal of experience among us all.

Keep us posted, please.

Djin

Athena#2 said...
I'm just so worried because I fear I will never have sex with my wife again and that is making me crazy.

That isn't a likely outcome. We have two neurovascular bundles that are responsible for erections. These lie along the outside of the prostate on either side. The majority of the time they are not involved by the cancer. In addition, erections are still possible with one functioning bundle if the other does have to be removed because of more advanced cancer.

BTW, your absolute PSA is not the issue, rather it's the recent rate of rise. Keep in mind that PCa is not the only reason one's PSA can go up; however, you want to rule it out, of course.

Djin

Post Edited (DjinTonic) : 12/3/2022 4:38:34 PM (GMT-8)

Athena#2 said...
I'm just so worried because I fear I will never have sex with my wife again and that is making me crazy............By the way thank you so much for all your reassurances. It's the worst time in my life.

Most of us have been there and it is not fun but it will pass once you actually know something and have a plan if needed. There are lots of treatment options to consider when the time comes. "The idle mind is the devil's workshop" which is where you are at right now so fight the urge to make up stuff that could happen as that is a slippery slope and pretty soon you are careening down the hill with no brakes.

My diagnosis was a few months after I retired and pretty much scuttled my retirement plans then Covid hit and made sure I would not be catching up real soon. It often happens when you least expect it, that is the way it is in life.

Prostate cancer changed my life. Most people on here hadn’t had sex in 20 years anyway because they’d been married 40.

When you’re single and you’re using it, I honestly don’t know how anyone could honestly sugar coat it.

Thank you for your post. I did have sex about 48 hours before my test. I'm more concerned about the nodule that showed up about six months ago. The medical journals say that better than 75% of them are benign. I don't seem to have any of the obvious symptoms that come with cancer other than than the nodule. Up until two years ago my PSA average was 0.5 to 0.6 it's only been going up over the last two years. First to 1.0, then 1.5 and now to 2.5. I work out two hours a day five days a week and have never been in the hospital my entire life.

This is why I'm so upset, can't sleep, nervous all the time and have lost a lot of interest in sex, which we have
been having 2 or 3 times a week until this happened. I'm trying to keep positive thoughts.

This forum has been a god send to me just knowing others are in the same boat. Thank you so much for reaching out to me.

As a point of possible clarification, a concerning prostate nodule would be inside of you and felt by the doctor during a somewhat invasive digital (finger) exam. You would typically not notice such a prostate nodule yourself. Just want to make sure you are describing it correctly.

Yes, good sleep can be tough to come by at first. Same thing can happen if you have an irregular EKG and start worrying about heart problems although possible cancer seems to bother people more. In the absence of facts, we tend to think up the worse stuff possible for a while until enough time passes and we are still here and feel the same way as we did before anything happened. It is amazing that we can take one errant data point and extrapolate a line to our eventual death without consideration of the folly of such an exercise. Hey, I did it also but sanity returns at some point as the data comes in and the doctors discuss the options and the future direction becomes more clear.

When the check engine light on my car came on, I checked it out and found it was an environmental sensor that was reporting below specification thus my car was not going to stop anytime soon and global warming was not going to be materially affected. I eventually got it fixed for free under warranty provisions for a known defect and my vehicles’s life goes on. Similar?

Post Edited (Mumbo) : 12/4/2022 7:36:02 AM (GMT-8)

The image of us older guys having sex isn't something I care to entertain. 😀

Athena#2, I think that in all probability you will continue to live your life as you always have.

island time said...
Prostate cancer changed my life. Most people on here hadn’t had sex in 20 years anyway because they’d been married 40.

I haven’t had sex since 2017 but (checking my watch) it’s only 2245 (10:45 PM for you land lubbers).

Clocknut, You and your wife got that!

Sammas, I can't agree more with your statement. Through the whole month of September, I saw 2 blurbs (whatever you call them) regarding PCa. It's sad that PCa is not reported on more frequently in the media to make men more aware of the need for PSA screening and PCa.

Boomer