Update on my continuing Brachytherapy story....

There's no picture with this, because none of us wants to see a prostate I'm sure. Nor the other stuff nearby, which is mostly all X-rated.

I went for my first visit to the Cancer Center this morning, exactly 50 days after the radioactive implants were installed. I'm getting to know my way around in there now, but the coffee in the cafeteria, being from a Starbucks blend, leaves a hell of a lot to be desired, in my humble opinion. To me, it tastes like three days old and overcooked. But I digress...

The purpose of the visit was for a blood sample to check my PSA level to see how the radioactivity is working on the cancerous spots. Although it's officially a bit too soon for a test of that, we did one anyway, and it shows a reading of 8.2 which is down from 15.0 before the brachytherapy was done. The nice lady doctor who did the procedure for me says this is very good, and my next test will not be for six months. 

I mentioned about talking to my family doctor about the procedure, and him saying "Well, you can forget about dying from prostate cancer now - we will have to find you something else to go on." - and she said, "Actually, he's right!"

She asked how I felt as I was recovering from the procedure and I said that it was a lot less messy and less painful than the two prostate biopsies I had before being referred to her clinic. She seemed pleased with that. Me too! I said that I'm recommending this procedure to anyone who might qualify for it, because it's the best solution to a nasty problem.

I just hope I live long enough to repay them at least part of the cost of that whole thing. I know I likely won't be around long enough to pay off the whole cost of that procedure, which is somewhere in the $20,000 range, but I do want to try to pay them back for the seed implants anyway, and since there's 125 of those, and each one costs between $50 and $60 (yes that's right!) even that will take me a few years of monthly donations. At last I'm putting some of my former cigarette money to good use. That nice doctor thanked me for my donation, and I said "It's the least I can do - Thank You for saving my hide!"



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