The stitches finally gave way from being constantly soaked in blood, exposing the tubing and caused a massive infection. The best thing about the whole experience was having the thing removed!
After a serious bout of depression, I was able to find a urologist outside of my insurance network who has been awesome the past year. Dr. Maurice Garcia...
He's listen to my worries and concerns about redoing the implant. He's dealt with lingering nerve pain from the first surgery. He's removed some of the scar tissue that formed once the first implant was taken out.
He does a fair number of implants at UC San Francisco Medical and several at the local VA Hospital. He performs and lectures on sex change surgery, so he can make a penis! Yes... I did jokingly say to him, if you can make it bigger, go for it!
He's conservative on what he promises for outcome. I still have some scar tissue in the shaft, he may have to do the implant in stages, replacing tubes as the scar tissue stretches out of the way. Something I would rather know now than, "oh did I forget to tell you that" when I get out of surgery. And most importantly, he's played the insurance game to its best, getting full approval from my insurance to pay for the surgery even though they have no contract with UCSF!
So wish me luck that the second time around does the trick. At least I already know what to expect and while it's NO FUN, at least this time I hope to have an erection on demand when it is all healed and done.
-Greg
