This might tug a bit!

I have such a low pain threshold...

Recovery was going generally well. I was at home, in my own bed and managing to keep my spirits relatively high. To recap, I was discharged from Gloucester hospital with a catheter, a drain from one of my wounds and staples in my stomach, a good look I am sure that you would agree.

The nurses were great at the Urology department, keeping an eye on the dressing and catheter etc, but I will be honest I was ready to get some of these tubes out of me. The drain normally comes out at 24/48 hours after surgery, it takes away any body juices created during surgery and stops you from getting an infection. For some reason my body wanted to continue making this ‘juice’ (I am sure just for the bloody fun of it) and therefore the drain had to stay in place until this resided.

So with my drain still in place, so did my catheter bag remain. I ain’t going to lie here, it was great to drink all that I wanted and not have to keep going to the loo, however, if you don’t keep an eye on the exit area (eye of the penis), it can get a little sore. Lube fellas, just keep on lubing.

It was a great day, approximately 2 weeks later, when the Urology nurse said:

Nurse: “Mark, I think that we can take the catheter and drain out now”

Me: “Amazing, let’s get this done!”

Nurse: “Now this might tug a little bit as I pull it out, it is probable that the skin has formed round the drain tube”

My Brain: “Say fucking what now? You telling me that my body has actually grown onto the tube?”

Me: “OK, that sounds interesting. How much is it going to hurt?”

Nurse: “Hopefully not too much”

As I gripped her elbow (if she was going to hurt me, I was as sure to share) with one of my hands, she pulls the drain out of my stomach in one swift motion, it was like she was pulling an extra long worm out, it was gross . Thankfully, no pain for either of us. Now I was expecting a hole to be left behind, however, no. It sorted of just disappeared. Next was the catheter. This one I was even more nervous about.

So with boxers round my ankles, me lying on the bed and tube dangling out the end of my tinky, the nurse starts getting ready to whip this tube out of me as well:

Nurse: “I will be quick OK”

My Brain: “Please don’t hurt me penis, it has been through a lot recently”

Me: “OK, lets do this”

Whip…out it came in one swoosh and my penis was free again. Then it was the, you need to pee before I let you go conversation. So with water being taken onboard, I then soon needed to go to ‘drain the vein’…to say that I suddenly realised that I hadn’t pee’d normally for a couple of weeks, I was nervous. What if it doesn’t work properly, what if I cant pee? I stand at the toilet, looking down, wishing for the miracle of urination to take place and after what seems like an eternity, a flow starts. Thank the lord….I can pee!

It may seem like such a small thing, pee’ing. However, when your body has been through all of these traumas, the small wins are still wins. I took everyone as a step towards recovery and getting back to where I was pre-op.

A few days later I was back again to have the staples taken out of my op-wounds. I was so prepared for this one, with a good strong paracetamol taken about an hour before the appointment, in I went to the same nurse and jumped on the bed. One by one she gently pulled these metal staples out of my stomach and dropped them in to plastic kidney shaped dish to the side of me. It was strange to think that Dr Akhtar had recently used these holes to extract my prostate, cut away a little bit of tissue around the outside of my prostate for good measure and sow my bladder back together…modern medicine! Amazing!

It was good to start seeing some notable progress in regard to my recovery and seeing my body start looking like it did pre-op, however, the mental strain of this cannot be underestimated. It was tiring. And what about the cancer? Is it gone?

Cancer treatment is such a holistic approach, and complex! Head on over to my next post “So is ‘it’ still there?” as it just gets going.

If you need more support then there are some great charities ready to help:

United Kingdom: https://prostatecanceruk.org

United States: https://www.pcf.org