The Hospital Stay

    I checked into the hospital September, 21 1999 at 7:30 A.M. and they took me to a prep room where my wife and son got to come along. There we got to meet the anesthetist and the Doctor and his assistant. We also had to fill out more paper's, plus a release for the local TV station to fill it as this was National Prostate Cancer Day. We were all together until they took me to the operating room at about 9 AM. They went to a waiting room and I went to surgery. The surgery lasted 4 and 1/2 hours and then the recovery was about 2 and 1/2 hours. It was a very long day for them but it only seemed like a couple of seconds to me. My family was kept informed the whole time on how all was progressing. All went well and when I got back to my room both my wife and son was waiting for me.

    I did find out the next day that the pathology report said the cancer was on both sides and further along then originally thought. But the report said all cancer was removed with clean clear margins. So everyone seems to be really pleased. I started walking right away the same day and that night. The nurses kept checking on me every hour to make sure I was OK and to see if I needed anything. I felt real good that night and I was ready to go home and heal right away so I could go back to work. The next night I started to come down with a real high fever, they gave me everything and got that under control. But the gas was building up in my stomach and that started to get very uncomfortable. The walking helped but I did have a hard time trying to pass the gas. Getting in and out of bed was not to hard but they would not let me do it with out help. Once I started to pass the gas I began to feel great.

    My surgery was on Tuesday and they let me go home that Friday before noon. Before I got to leave the doctor took out one of my suction drains and removed the huge bandage from my stomach. Removing them both was not fun. The drain was pulled real fast so it would not get caught inside of me, and it burned pretty good after it came out, but that was better then trying to do it slow. The Big bandage when it came off ripped some of the skin off my stomach too, and that hurt, it did start to bleed pretty good too. The stitches were a little sore and my bottom is sore also. It felt like a very large lump was left in the left side of my butt. And when I sit down it was very uncomfortable. It feels like a foot or something when it goes to sleep. All tingly and like pins and needles. The nurses at the hospital were really nice and very helpful. I got my wheelchair ride to the front door, and they helped me get into my wife's car.