Post prostatectomy sex life

InTheShop said...
sex isn't the answer.
sex is the question.
yes is the answer.

love is the drug
and I need to score

Better sex after an RP? That seems nearly impossible. As good as sex after an RP? I suppose the odds are better for that - similar to your chances of winning the Power Ball.

Seriously guys.

slapshot, thank you.

Everytime this comes up I hesitate to respond. Why? Because I know there are a few here who will refuse to believe that I am telling the truth of MY experience. Well, guys, it is the truth as I have experienced it. Not much else to say about it.

You guys who have the opposite experience--well, your experience is what it is. It's a bell curve, I suppose. Exactly where the mean lands is hard to say--the data is notoriously difficult to pin down. I suggest, however, that in response to this particular question, those who have experienced a complete loss (and who waste no energy sharing it whenever asked) are no more indicative of the true midrange experience than those of us who report the opposite.

I am three years post surgery and I have noticed a recent surge in my erections. Prior I was getting to 80-85% and now on occasion I can hit 95%. Not sure why other than it takes the nerves time to heal. Its not what it was but my wife and I have learned to work with it for sure.

I am not in agreement with those who praise RP as life saving procedure. It might be for certain small percentage of those who had some moderate success in recovery of sexual function, but for big number of cases it is life changing procedure which destroys temporarily or permanently sexual functioning. Prostate is integral part of man’s genito-urinary system. I you damage or take out any part, it does not matter how small it is, that system definitely is not functioning in the same way.
If mechanic would do same way to your car while throwing the integral parts out of your engine, what would you tell your mechanic? “You are crazy. I will never bring my car to you”. - that would be answered by most of us. I am sure everyone agrees about mechanic. Then, what is different with urologists. Nothing to my knowledge.
What about RP side effects? High percentage of patients experienced them from being temporary few months to few years, all the way to being permanent.
At time of my RP, I was 51 year old, healthy guy with no chronic conditions, not on any medication, non smoker, non drinker, in excellent physical shape and very active, not overweight, never in mylife took any depression medication, and never tried Viagra or Cialis before RP. Never before had any problems with achieving and maintaining my erections as long as my wife wanted it to last.
Second and third round in my forties was never problem. I had perfect and very enjoyable long lasting orgasams. Sex for my wife and I was food for soul and body.
Per my urologist, I was the guy to reach trifecta within 6-12 months. Some of you here know rest of my recovery. I never recovered any sexual function, I lost 2+ inches of length and some girth. Never experienced sign of life in my penis, just dead appendage. I lost my orgasmic function and I am total anorgasmia. RP killed my testosterone to 217, and I can go on and on and on....
I am not a man anymore, I em eunuch, nothing can trigger spark anymore.
For those who want to hear it and believe- truth is told. For those who want to throw stones on me, I am not afraid because truth should be told.
Life after RP is mostly worthless.
MK

There are three groups of men who have surgery for PC:

1. There are men (probably the majority of surgery cases) who have surgery because their diagnosing Uro recommended it. They do no further questioning, no further research, and they do it because "doctor knows best". We don't hear from them or see them here, we have no information about their outcome, and we never will. To be fair, there are men diagnosed late with mets happening, and their Uro sends them to radiation because their case is beyond what surgery can help.

2. There are men who have surgery because they had a Uro who discouraged further investigation by the patient. Or the health system where they live (some foreign countries) still sees surgery as first option for uncomplicated cases. This is real. Both ways. There are still Uro's out there who discourage and bad mouth radiation with the half-truths and only see the payday. I truly believe these doctors are in the minority. These are the men who let their "get it out" response run ahead of their knowing that they really need to slow down.

3. Then there are men who choose surgery because it is their best decision based on their personal criteria for availability, need for treatment, time constraints, etc. It is a truly rational decision that needs no justification. Men who have very large prostates that are causing other misery, men who live long distances from treatment, men who have other life situations that mitigate against 6 weeks of daily radiation, men who live where SBRT isn't available, etc.

At the end of the day, it's an individual decision. And, interestingly enough--and there are earlier threads on this topic--treatment regret rarely appears in men in group 3 above. Group 1, we don't know about. They aren't here to report. Group 2, we know about, they are here. You guys who feel like you 'lost it all' with surgery, I feel for you, I really do. I don't want to discount your pain. Hang in there.

BTW, I wonder what happened to the OP? It's his thread--and has he ever commented?

Everyone’s opinions, in PCa as in life, are colored by their own experiences. We’ve obviously had many varied experiences. Any new guys reading this thread should consider that, and make their own decisions based on their due diligence, their priorities, and their tolerance for the various risks involved in each treatment. Period.

halbert said...
...
BTW, I wonder what happened to the OP? It's his thread--and has he ever commented?

He's done 6 posts, all on this thread. Last post last week. Likely he got the info he needed/wanted and this thread has taken on a life beyond that.

But it is a good reminder to posters - do keep in mind that a thread like this should be to help the OPs.

I posted on this topic in replying to the OP regarding what can be expected for a sex life after RP. These were my experiences. I have 100 posts in 7 years which is only 1 to 2 weeks worth for some of our risings stars during the covid pandemic threads so I am not known for standing up on my soap box advocating one procedure over another. I know that this forum is different than some, like truck wars for example, Ram vs GM vs Ford etc. because we are dealing with a cancer that affects all of us in sometimes very life altering ways and some get emotional about some of the negatives they have received regarding procedures.

I personally have had a fairly easy time so far with PC compared to some but I have to comment on some of the false comments from a few posters on this thread.

1) 90,000 RP are performed on the average in the USA/year give or take. These numbers are not dropping. If most men after RP experienced 100% ED, 2"loss of length and some girth of penis, large drop in "T" 100% incontinence, etc., for the rest of their lives when before procedure, they were 100% sexually normal, when there are far better ways of dealing with PC,(RT/Brachy), RP's would quickly disappear as an option.

2) Do a quick search on the Prostate. It is not required for life or even for sex. It is not the same as someone stated, removing an important part of your engine and expecting your car to work. Remove your heart or kidneys, thats different. A couple of benefits of no prostate is before RP, every five minutes, I had to pee for 5 minutes. At the urinal, I could finish War and Peace before the first drops came out. Now, it's Old Faithful. Another plus is that my wife is thankful for less of a mess due to seminal fluids during orgasm. Also,women choose to remove their breasts due to breast cancer and some remove their breasts just because breast cancer runs in the family and because their breasts are not needed for life as is our prostates, they do not want the chance of future cancer.

3) Before RP in a meeting with my Uro, I asked him about side affects after surgery. He said that your sex life will not be the same as before surgery but the chance of some sort of ED and incontinence varies from person to person. A lot has to do with how strong your sex life was before surgery and how strong and fit you are after surgery. But he said that every procedure has SE. I found this to be true.

4) Looking back now if given the choice of removing my prostate(organ possibly contained) and having the possibility of a cure even if there was going to be some ED and incontinence or living with Brachy for 10 years or RT, and the SE of these procedures, my decision would not have changed.

It's been 7 years since RP. Just turned 71. Competed this winter in 2 world loppets, 50km(Gatineau) placed 4th in my age group and 55km(Hayward, Wisconsin) where I placed 3rd, plus 2 other shorter races where I was 1st.
Not bad for a guy with no prostate.

Dave

MK1965,
When I looked up figures for RP quickly, 2012 was the only year that came up. If the numbers are radically different this year, my apologies.
Dave

halbert said...
Whenever this topic rolls up, I really wish there was a really useful place to find actual data about just how prevalent and how severe the ED related side effects are. And it just doesn't seem to be readily available. I've looked many times.

what does the surgeon say? he has no incentive to lie to you

F8: here's what my surgeon said to me, as best as I recall from 5+ years ago: Based on your individual case information, and my experience, you have a 90% chance of making trifecta within 6 months. He was right--it was less than that.