What A Bummer!

On June 1st I had my check up, a cystoscopy. The next day a member of the medical team said he had seen nothing that screamed “cancer” at him but naturally they needed to see the results of the examination of the biopsy samples to be sure. I was encouraged that they were not treating the analysis as urgent and I was greatly cheered.

OK, that procedure set off a load of irritation in my urinary system again and I was up five or six times during the night and swallowing a lot of pain killers but I was damned optimistic.

A couple of weeks ago Mr R’s secretary rang me to give me an appointment date to get the results and as that date was a couple of weeks ahead I was further reassured. After all, this is cancer and if there was a problem they would want to act quickly.

This morning I attended for that appointment feeling very confident though of course I knew there was always the chance of bad news and it was bad news that turned up.

There is still cancer in the lining of my bladder. OK, it’s nothing like the huge tumour that was there last year and there is no immediate danger but it can’t be left unattended.

We talked through various options or, at least, I looked at possible ways of avoiding surgery, but all other options closed off one by one. Dr. W. from the Christie had been involved in the discussions and had said chemo and radiation had done all they could.
There was a possible treatment using a diluted TB vaccine applied directly to the interior of my bladder in what sounded like a rather unpleasant procedure to be repeated once a week for about six weeks but even that would only delay not avoid surgery so I am left with the stark choice of radical surgery to remove my bladder, my prostate and a few other bits and pieces or letting cancer run its course.

Much as the prospect of major surgery and pissing into a stoma bag for the rest of my life is deeply unattractive the prospect of the rest of my life being quite short and painful is even less attractive so surgery it will be.
There is, it appears, no rush and Mr R wants to see the results of an MRI scan first to help guide his hand so surgery is likely to be in September.

I remember saying and possibly writing last year that I wanted to go to sleep until Christmas when it was all over. Well, I’m saying it again now.

Roll on Christmas when hopefully this will be all over.