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Famous Quotation: “What we have here, is a failure to communicate”  Can you guess where that line came from?  Anyone?  Beuller??  Leave your comments below.

This “failure to communicate” on this site is very one-sided.  It’s all me spewing verbiage about how things are going in my life and all that.  Well, I am not one to apologize for the way things are; so let’s get this started.

May 20th, just 27 days ago, my physical being changed.  Got a faulty part removed.  The doc said to do it, and he did it.  Easy.  Right?  Nope.  Perhaps the extraction was easy (for him), and I guess since all I did was sleep through the entire procedure, the operation was pretty easy for me too.  But I am here to tell you, robot assisted laparoscopic removal or not, healing might be the toughest part!

Oh sure, doc said to “the first week, aspire to nothing” (don’t do a thing) and live “a sedentary lifestyle”.  Light activities, no lifting, and don’t cough either!  The key here is to let the parts and pieces fall back into place and re-connect the way they were before they were surgically violated.  Be a good patient and just focus on healing.`

And I gotta tell you, I am a really good patient!  You want sedentary?  I got that.  You want my aspirations to be zero?  I can do that too.  Didn’t cough or sneeze or lift a finger (thank you Renee!), no not at all.  The surgery felt like a punch in the gut, and it was simple to stay “sedentary” that first week.

The second week was easier.  The pain was significantly less.  I was given a green light for walking.  Even VERY LIGHT (less than ten pounds) lifting was authorized.  So I walked.  Miles at a time, I walked.  Since my bladder is still learning how to do its job again, my only constraint was: where is the next toilet?  First trip out was around the block, next time it was three and a half miles, next trip about a mile, next trip seven and a quarter miles, and the latest trip was about two miles.  Yes, I am good at walking!

Week three was more of the same.  Just tried to eat and drink anything that would help me get strong.  And sleep too.  And I walked some more.

Now I am working on week number four; post surgery.  Day 27.  More walking and now I am working angled push-ups (using the countertop) into my day and really easy leg-ups.  I don’t think I’ll be doing much more until the next visit to the doctor…..which is in twelve days.

And this is what it has all come down to.  June 28th is find-out-how-surgery-went Day.  One week prior to 6/28 I let the vampires have a go at my veins to draw some blood, then have it checked for PSA numbers.

PSA is Prostate Specific Antigen.  If you have a prostate (and are more than 16 years old), you have evidence of it pulsing inside your veins with every beat of your heart in the form of PSA numbers.  Detectable amounts are always there, unless you DON’T have a prostate.  Like me.  And when the PSA levels are measured on June 21st and the results are communicated to me on June 28th, they should be REALLY LOW.  If they are, the recent surgical procedure can be deemed a clinical success.  Only then will the balloons and confetti fly, champagne with lots of toasting, and speeches and dinners, vacations, etc….all that.  Good news like this should come with a parade.  Or at least a party!!

If not.  It would be a bad sign.  The reality is, if PSA numbers are remotely similar to what they were prior to the surgery, the cancer may have spread to another area.  Even though the prostate has been removed, the misbehaving cellular activity from the originating cells may continue from their new home (in a kidney or liver or ??).  And there we go with the “watchful waiting” and possibly more “treatments”.  Ugh.

This may be why I have been a little quiet lately.  I’ve been a little distracted…..so that needs to change.  I think I’ll just start looking forward to a party!