Hello just diagnosed and very frightened

Have you ever been anesthetized before? It's a piece of cake. Exactly that same as closing your eyes at night and falling asleep and waking up the next morning. I personally know of several hospital disasters, and have heard about many more... none of them involved the anesthesiologist... if that hospital and staff are that good, I am sure the anesthetics are just as good.

I don't think cowardice has anything to do with it... maybe when you were a kid, you had a subconscious experience of falling and fought to wake up, and it scared the crap out of you. Those weird experiences as a kid can follow us into adulthood.

Maybe you can pray about it... 

Steve1961 said:

Thanks

I will pray about it but when u have anxiety issues it’s tough i been battling damn Anxiety all my lifec

My brother I understand your anxiety with being diagnosed. I was told October 17 2017 with a Gleason6,

I am currently on active survelliance after review of my T3 MRI this week and future psa test

and MRI Fusion biospy in the future.  I have had 4 surgerys in my life and the only thing you will remember

is waking up in recovery. You have took your time talked to many Doctors as I believe your Gleason score 

is alot worse than mind. You have to make the decision you feel most comfortable for you, no one can do it for you

I completely understand. Ther are some great people on this Network that have been through  alot and can give you information

I have found out me personally talking with a prostate group in my hometown with men that have fought this battle

can also ease your anxiety I urge to pray on your decision and you will find some comfort and peace along the way

to a healthy future . 

Godspeed

Steve, you have to be comfortable with your choice.  If it really scares you, then I understand how that might sway you away from surgery.  But as others have said, it is not unpleasant, and lets face it, if you live long enough, then at some point in your life you are going to have anesthesia for something. I didn't want to be the first one to respond here, as we have discussed this several times already. But as others have now said, it really is not scary in any way.

The first thing they do is put an IV in your arm and then go over some paperwork. Then they give you a drug called Versed, which is sort of like Valium. It goes in the IV so you don't feel anything. It will make you dreamy and totally relaxed.  Then you may be aware of people around you talking to you, then next thing you know, you're waking up in the recovery room, not even knowing what time it is.

I've probably mentioned it somewhere before, but I've had fourteen surgeries for which I was under anesthesia. The most recent was just three weeks ago.  I don't even count stuff like biopsies and colonoscopies. If I did then that would put me over twenty for sure.  I have to count the surgical scars on my body just to come up with the number 14... plus I get a biopsy every two years for another condition unrelated to my prostate cancer.

I'm not trying to sway you in any direction. Yes, there are some things that can possibly go wrong with anesthesia and with surgery. You will be required to sign a release form that sounds scary of you read it. But in 99.9999% of cases nothing goes wrong. I understand your concern, and if it really scares you that much then go with what you feel may be safer. Just be aware that radiation is not necessarily safe. There are side effects from radiation that may not show up until much later in your life.

Steve1961 said:

Last post for a while

 Thank you for all of your support I will not be posting again until I make up my mind it seems like when I lean one way I read stuff ithen lean the other way which is not good. I have probably broken the record of her posts which I’m not proud of but I guess I’m thankful for I hope I’m not sounding like a hypochondriac. This is why I’m having such a tough time deciding.  I am lucky enough to have two great hospitals near me Stanford and UCSF. I won’t tell you about all the doctors I saw but I will about the ones at UCSF because I thought they were the best. UCSF is ranked 4 for the nation number one in funding. I was lucky enough to see their top surgeon Dr. Peter Carol with 32 years of experience in over 6000 surgeries . After talking with him the second time Ifelt more comfortable he’s the only one that did the genetic testing which turned out to be that the cancer I have is a high-risk really just meaning that I should not sit back and watch it. This doctor told me that 40% of his patients aren’t active surveillance but that would not be good for me.  He went on to talk about the cribI form and so on and so forth but to my surprise he went on to talk about radiation and how he thinks that if I do radiation I should do two forms not just one. He went on to think that I would fare well with radiation and if I was to fail it thinks it will be late maybe 12 15 years later. And then he said there’s a lot of things we can do and that they usually comes back  very small. When I asked the doctor what he thinks I should do for the best chance of a cure this is what he tells me. He tells me this is patient preference that there is no preferred way both outcomes are the same short and long term both have a 20% chance of failure rate but he said that it was him he would take it out but the choice is up to me. 

So now I talked to their top radiologist his name is Dr. Hsu.  asked him a lot of questions I asked him about the chance of getting a secondary cancer he said they done a lot of studying and they’ve come to the conclusion that the chances of that are slim to none you have more of a chance of dying on the operating table I kind of find that hard to believe. I asked him why did he change his mind about the treatment I was going to do mono treatment two doses of HDR in one day. I decided to change it because of the defifer report just to make sure were giving the stronger  Best method they have. This would be the combo internal and next ternal. I asked him what the failure rates were and he said that over the last seven years is drop down to below 10%.  He said it works extremely well he said he’s very very confident that I will be a good candidate for. I asked him what are the chances of me living another 10 or 15 years with this treatment and his answer was absolutely he says  am going to cure you that is the goal and I feel very confident.i wonder if he says that to all his patients ...  I asked if is it true that more people do surgery over radiation and he said no the numbers are about equal now. Granted I have to do 25 treatments but they’re very tolerable and then one treatment breaktherapy HDR. He was supposed to call me back on Wednesday or Thursday but I guess he got busy. I have about 15 more questions that will definitely help me choose I want to know the short term side effects which I didn’t ask him  and I want to know the effects of the immediate organs i like the rectum and chances of bleeding and those sort of things n the big big question will be what are the chances of the cancer that I have not respond to radiation this is a huge question because that really has me spooked also want to know about this space O.A.R. thing anyway once I talk to him hopefully Monday I will  definitely be able to make my decision if he answers all the questions and I feel comfortable with all his answers I will do the radiation because even though tha advantage is if surgery is that you know right away if it was a success or maybe not so much  if any positive margins and even then 30 % chsnce of reoccurance there’s a lot of What Ifs with the surgery and believe it or not this combo radiation approach just might be a much better way to go not that it’s a sure thing either ..but they hsve come a long way with it ......but I want this done within the next few eeeks either way ...waiting is too stressful kniwing what I know Now and another big one is how will we know if the combo approach was a success ..don’t think I want to wait 5 or 6 years for that either.....

thanks I will appreciate your input .just wanted  everyone to know my dilemma  lots of people here told me to calm down take my time and get many opinions which I did I feel like I’m procrastinating and I hate that but I just wanted to see this last doctor and that’s how long it took me to see him now it’s time to make a move thanks again 

Steve

I sympathise, I really do. It is a lot to take in and these are important decisions. The good news is that everyone on this forum has gone through similar. I have too and i have my own overthinking issues over my re-occurrence so I know how hard it can be. Finding all the facts out is the right thing to do but you have to bear in mind two things - surgery and radiotherapy have roughly the same success rate and both have side-effects that can be managed. The key thing is to make a decision, have faith in it and see it through. There does come a point where you need to take action, whatever it is. Trust yourself.

Cushions

Hi Steve,

How long since your treaments?  Sometimes the worst side effects are up front and lessen over time.

Dave 3+4

Steve1961 said:

About 3 weeks 

About 3 weeks 

Hopefully some of your post radiation side effects will lessen in the coming weeks. Hope for the best...........................

Dave 3+4