Surgery 4 weeks ago

[Dave92014]

My implant surgery was 10/31/12 and yesterday I had my 4 week post-surgery doctor's visit.
There are a few things going on that I have not seen in other posts so I will describe
them.

First, I had a little additional work most people don't because the opening to my
inguinal canal, which the surgeon uses to insert the reservoir into the abdominal
cavity, was so large that the surgeon thought the reservoir might fall back down into
the scrotum. So he put in a few stitches to tighten up the opening. This is the
same opening involved in hernias but he said the "fix" was not a real hernia
repair. My surgeon has been my urologist for 15 years. Three years ago during
my annual DRE he checked for hernia and said I had a small hernia, but not enough
to repair. The last two years and at the pre-surgery exam he checked for hernia
and said there was none. Post-surgery those stitches have caused me some pain
in the lower left abdominal area. For the first 2 weeks the pain was rather
widespread, over an area about 5 inches wide and the area was a bit swollen.
The pain mostly cleared up during the third week except when I move in a
way that stretches that area too much. And when I sneeze it feels like I
stuck a fork into my lower abdomen so if I feel a sneeze coming on, I have
developed a panting breathing exercise to avoid sneezing. I also still have some
tenderness at the base of the penis on the left side, and I am not sure if
that is caused by those stitches or by the implant hardware. I am confident
the pain will go away before long as things heal up.

My surgeon did a vertical incision in scrotum whereas one of the videos on the
Internet showed a horizontal incision. Some of the guys on FT have reported
quite a bit of pain from the incision but I had very little and it was gone within
a few days of the surgery. So the vertical incision might have been easier on
the pain issue. The scab fell off after about 10 days but there was something
at the top of the incision. My doc had some post-op rules and one was not to
mess with his stitches. He had used the durma-bond glue stuff so there was not
much of stitches obvious. At the second visit I asked him about the thing
at the top and he said it was a left-over stitch and removed it. Then before
my 4 week check I noticed that there was about 1/16 inch of a stitch poking out
at the bottom of the incision. So I asked the doc about that and he whipped out
his scalpel and did something to make it go away. In both cases he used some
liquid which I think was a pain killer so I did not feel any pain from whatever
he did.

Now the main pain I have remaining is in the left half of my scrotum and my left
testicle. Before surgery my right testicle was lower than the left, so my doc
tried to position the AMS pump below the left testicle. The scrotum on the
left side is still a bit black and blue and sensitive to the touch. The scrotum
on the right side is not painful to the touch at all. At each
visit to the doc he has pumped me up a little and then released it. This has
been a painful process due to the fact that the scrotum is so sensitive. But
it only takes a few minutes so I just do a lot of teeth gritting.

My doc made my next appointment for 3 weeks from now, 7 weeks after surgery, and
he says he will teach me how to pump then. I have not been attempting to pump
myself. I have the AMS 700CX so it cylinders do not extend in length. My
doc says he feels that if the surgeon measures the penis correctly, there is
no need for the length extending capability of the 700LCX. I am assuming that
since the length is not extending I don't need to start early on pumping. And
since the scrotum is so tender, pumping would involve some pain that I want to
avoid.

I have been feeling around to identify the bulb and the release button on the
pump. For the last two weeks I have been soaking in my spa every day, set to 101 degrees F.
I have noticed that when I am in the spa the characteristics inside
my scrotum change. In the spa the testicles, and maybe some other stuff, seem
to float upward so the pump is by itself, low in the scrotum and I can easily
identify the pump bulb and release button. When I am not in the spa
all the stuff in the scrotum moves together and I find it much more difficult
to identify where the release button is. I am sure that when I start actually
using it I won't have trouble with the release button, but being able to feel
things out in the spa has been handy. And maybe the heat of the spa helps
the healing process, which is why I have been doing the daily soaks.

I have been using several pills that have anti-inflammatory characteristic
since 5 days after surgery. Ibuprofen is the first one. I started with
400 mg every 4 hours and backed off gradually to where I am now taking
200 mg every 8 hours. I also use some supplements, Tumeric with Meriva and
Anatabine, that have anti-inflammatory characteristics. I don't know that
these have sped up the process any since I am 4 weeks from surgery and
still 3 weeks away from pumping, but I am still using them to do whatever they
might do.

[radiodec]

There seem to be as many opinions on implant post-op and on implant type and sizing as there are urologists doing implant surgery.

My urologist used to do Coloplast implants but then switched to AMS. Even for the AMS700LGX he doesn't believe in starting pumping before the healing is good enough for sex. Maybe he doesn't think we would do well at resiting the temptation for early testing?

One of the main benefits of the AMS700LGX is that it gives those of us that are used to our tools growing to the job at hand a more natural feel and less adjustment. Since I used to double in length from flacid to erect, I would have had a longer adjustment to the flacid length of a penis with an implant.

On to the hernia stuff. Old undescended testicle repair and repairs at the same time to a "suspected or possible hernia" under the undescended testicle left a load of scar tissue that complicated my implant. I got an extra incision to place the reservoir. Though the surgeon wasn't very talkative about the work from my late twenties, he didn't sound all that impressed by the work. Of course the old stuff added about an hour to the surgery and this was after a postponement to allow correction of scar tissue problems from my radical prostatectomy 13 years ago to heal.

Still, all went well and I had no real pain and only minor discomfort. Pain medication only in hospital and that for pain aggravated by a catheter that wouldn't drain correctly. Swelling and bruising so minor that it took two weeks of recovery to figure out there was any.

At week three and waiting to go for clearance to use things. Both incisions here horizontal.


Radiodec

[Dave92014]

I am seeing that in addition to the differences in opinions among the Urologists, there are differences in how fast people's bodies heal up. I had my idea of how fast my body "should" heal up, but I am realizing that it will do so on its own schedule, not my desires. I am now more patiently waiting for my body to heal up so I am ready to pump. It seems that yours is healing up fast, congrats on that! My time will come soon.