LMCatman wrote:Having (jealously) read your stories of quick recoveries and little pain...I am 46 days post implant (Titan). Swelling and tenderness finally has gone done and I can "feel around" in my nutsack. Surgeon is on vacation, his associate "pumped me up all the way", then couldn't find the deflate buttons. He made three very painful attempts (with a break in between) until I could stand no more and went home fully inflated (Tuesday). He said he thought the pump ball had "rotated" and the buttons were front/back instead of side/side. He nor I can get my fingers to "front/back". I've been massaging, trying to "spin" the pump, trying to get the buttons any way I can. No luck....any ideas?
I'm both baffled and shocked by this account. I've read it a couple of times. I hope you have found a way to deflate it by now. I'm not sure I know how to offer any effective advice, though I will offer a few comments for the benefit of others either considering an implant, or who are in the early stages of recovery.
I don't really understand the rotation explanation. I can easily rotate my pump by more that 90 degrees either clockwise or counterclockwise from its natural resting position. My natural resting position is deflate pads aligned front to back. I can easily grab and depress them in this position. But I can easily grab and depress them in any other rotational position too. The pads are symmetrical so plus or minus 90 degrees rotation covers all possible positions. Truthfully, I cannot understand the rotational issue you discuss, or how it prevents finding and depressing the deflate pads. Even if your pump is cemented in position and can't rotate, that shouldn't prevent you from finding and depressing the deflate pads. The only possibilities that conceivably occur to me are 1) the deflate pads have become so encased in scar or other tissue you can't get to them, or 2) the pump rides so high in your scrotum that the deflate pads, being the topmost part, are pulled so far up into your body that you can't reach them. However, I'm sure there must be some other explanation, and I just don't know enough.
I'm also shocked. I've commented many times that no one, and that applies even more to a medical professional like the "associate" you mention, should ever attempt to learn to inflate an implant without first being quite certain they know how to deflate it first. For me, and for many others, that first full inflation was excruciatingly painful quickly. The desire to deflate ASAP for pain relief is overwhelming. Seems to me that extensive familiarity with finding and depressing the deflate pads is lesson 1, in implant inflation 101. Only when that is mastered do you try inflating it. I would also think that if your surgeon does much implant volume at all, there would be more that one person familiar with implant operation. Nurses, PA's, maybe other doctors. If the "associate" can't make it work, I would think someone else would also be able to try their hand at it for you. Or, check the Coloplast web site and use the physician locator function to find other doctors in your area who are familiar with Titans.
Also, both Coloplast and AMS make model "keychain" replicas of the pump and deflate mechanisms. I know the Coloplast Titan replica is quite realistic, especially the feel of the deflate pads and how they operate. I've read the same about the AMS replica, though I have no personal experience with that. I had the replica over 2 months before surgery, and was able to use it to get extremely familiar with how the pump and deflate pads felt, before every trying to feel them inside my body. These "toys" are in fact quite useful in conditioning you as to what things will feel like inside your body. IMHO everyone should get one no later than the date of their surgery, and preferably well before that.
I assume you know what the pump and deflate pads look like, which would aid you in trying to find the deflate pads. If you don't, "a picture is worth a thousand words" and might help you. Of course, the keychain replica is even more useful than that. Google "Coloplast Titan OTR picture" to see any number of pictures. Or go to this link:
http://titanpenileimplant.com/titan-otr-instructions/