I was diagnosed last week.
I am 62 and otherwise fit and healthy. Eat and exercise well. I lost my wife in early May to Cerebellar Ataxia (a bit like MND) after 15 years of increasing intense caring including PEG feeding for her food, water & meds for last 8 months. Retired from a demanding job at end of May (planned 2 years ago), the day before her funeral. The condition is genetic and one of my adult children has inherited it (no cure, no treatment).
I have had counselling for those 15 years and have been very open and championed male mental health - especially for senior male leaders. Ironic now! As well as my own mental wellbeing, the current position is an awful additional strain on my kids with everything else they have going on.
I had PSA tests every year until Lockdown and was always less than 1. Had a medical before retirement and it threw up a PSA of 6.24. Had an MRI which showed abnormalities. Had a transperineal biopsy (44 samples).
I (thinking I am Peter Pan) was expecting to just have an enlarged prostate. The consultant admitted he was not expecting to see much.
I have a Gleason score of 9. I must admit I did not take in as much as I should have done after I was told that. Consultant is seeing me again on Wednesday following their MDT meeting at which my case will have been discussed to discuss treatment options and next steps.
He said he wants to do a bone scan to check for spread elsewhere. He is talking about potential hormones and multi treatment - I think he talked about surgery and radiotherapy. I was not given any detail about a T score and don’t know whether I should expect that at this stage. I notice on here people seem to have more details from the biopsies than I do (detailed scores, and breakdown etc) and so I will ask for that this week.
I am compiling a list of questions for my meeting on Wednesday. Any suggestions, thoughts, comments, advice at this stage would be welcome. I’m delighted that a good friend whose husband has been through this pointed me to this forum.
My objective from any treatment options will be totally geared around maximising my life expectancy to spend time with my kids and our first grandchild who my wife got to spent just 6 days with.
I reckon I am a pretty resilient person that has dealt with a pile of sh*t over many years whilst holding down a demanding job and doing several community/volunteer roles. I have the tightest family in the world and an amazing group of close mates who already support me and know they will do so again. But I have to admit this has knocked the stuffing out of me.