I’m good to go to start my salvage radiation therapy on Thursday. Yippee. <sarcasm font>

You may recall in my last monthly update, I commented that I was having a dull ache in my testicles and groin. I really wanted to ensure that something weird wasn’t going on. Unfortunately, I experienced my first bit of a run-around with the VA Medical Center. After nearly a month of back-and-forth with the office and schedulers, I was able to see the urologist this afternoon.

In a nutshell, she did a physical exam and determined that there was no hernia. I can proceed with SRT Thursday.

I’ve continued my bladder-filing experiment through the weekend with mixed results. Again, I’m scheduled for zapping at 9:45 a.m. and I’m trying to be able to hold my bladder to at least 10:15 a.m.

Saturday, I had a complete fail—I couldn’t hold anything past 9:30 a.m., 15 minutes before my scheduled start time. Not good. Hopefully, I get this sorted out and what’s in my bladder will be sufficient for the zapping.

Date

Start
Drinking

Stop
Drinking

Urgency
at 9:45 a.m.
(1-10)

Need to
Empty
Bladder

Volume
(1-10)

30 June

8:45

9:15

5

10:45

5

1 July

8:35

9:10

7

10:15

7

2 July

8:30

9:05

8

9:30

6

3 July

8:45

9:15

4

10:10

7

4 July

8:40

9:15

4

10:25

5

5 July

8:30

9:15

4

10:40

5

Regarding Eligard / hormone therapy side effects, I’m not complaining. Fatigue remains the prevalent side effect. Luckily, no hot flashes yet and, surprisingly, I can still achieve an erection and orgasm to about the same level as before the Eligard. (A bit more effort is required.)

I’m not sure how much I’ll write about the actual SRT once it gets started. I’ll probably stick to the noteworthy items along the way. Let’s hope it does the trick with minimal damage along the way.

Be well!

This post originally appeared on Dan’s Journey Through Prostate Cancer on July 5, 2022. It is republished with permission.