I tend to be an over thinker and have carried much stress and anxiety over the course of the last few months regarding my procedure, results, and lifestyle. Often times, the information I would come across would relieve my worries, but it was always tiny bits and pieces of information, that may have satisfied one worry/concern, but left a dozen others behind. Other times I would ask a question, only to receive the typical "ask your doctor", which may be well intended, but provides ZERO to any discussion. I have my doctors contact info, but im trying to fall asleep tonight, not lay awake worrying...
Its important to note that we are all different and that this is my personal account of it all. This is not advice, but potential peace of mind.
1. WORRIES ABOUT THE PROCEDURE
Approaching my procedure, I had typical thoughts like "Oh man, is this REALLY what is left as far as options?" or "Do I really want to do something so irreversible?" These are questions that only you can answer, given what you want in life, your lifestyle, your condition or reasons that brought you to this point...etc. I can tell you personally, that I am younger than majority of people in here (36) and am recently divorced (2 years ago), so dating and being sexually active are VERY important for my intended lifestyle. Also regarding lifestyle, I am an avid basketball player, love riding horses and motorcycles, live a 'physical' lifestyle in many ways and worried just as I did with my heart condition that this would put a restriction on the activities I love.
The second piece of worries about the procedure were recovery time, ability, financial aspect, and rehab.
I am happy to say, that with a little time, including a few days where I thought to myself "what have I done?!" that I will jump on my Ducati after posting this, ride it down to the gym, shoot some hoops, then come back to the house and have sex with my girlfriend
I don't have a single physical restriction that has caused any change in my life that I can see thus far.
However, this did not come all at once. Be patient, but dont worry and think that mean you will be years out from now before you can feel "normal". I am just shy of 3 months post-op and I have sex daily, sometimes for over an hour... she is the one tapping out because even if I orgasm, I can still keep going and try for a second. The change has caused me to change my feelings of inadequacy from pre-op, where relationships were ruined due to my inabilities, to smirking, thinking about how in reality, the chicks who cast me aside are missing out. Missing out on ME.
2. WORRIES ABOUT THE RESULTS
Of course the main concern is the functionality of the penis and its ability to perform, but we'd be lying if we said we didn't care about lost size. Being tall and larger than average, the thought of losing size could potentially leave me feeling like I may have a usable penis, but what if I feel too shy as a result of lost size to ever use it? Going in to the procedure, I was about 7.5'' erect and when I came out, I kid you not, I was told by the doctor that he decided to use a different implant than planned, to accommodate my "larger size". I was in pain and somewhat delirious from the anesthesia, but was ecstatic.
This was short lived excitement. Reason 1, I had an allergic reaction to my antibacterial lining and was in agony for 5 days until the proper scrip came to the pharmacy. Reason 2, once this was sorted out and the swelling reduced, my penis was just over HALF the size it was before. This was the first time I had the "what have I done?!" moment. Reading on these forums, you will see constantly, "the size you are without pumping is pretty much the size you'll be rigid, with maybe half an inch difference or so".
To all those people who constantly comment "ask your doctor" "ask your doctor" "ask your doctor", I had. I had called them several times. I was even harsh on them regarding the size difference and not once was I told the reality of it.
The reality? All it takes is time... I was about 4'' in the first month, now being almost 3 months out, I am about 7''. There are many reasons for this, whether it be wrinkles, stretching, lack of use...etc but thats not important, don't try to over-diagnose yourself. Just be patient.
Another concern was the ability to become completely rigid. For the first 2 months, I would push and squeeze like hell on the bulb, but would never get to the point of being completely rigid (100% hard). Having seen comments on here about people saying that their implant gets harder than their natural erection ever could, I had begun to feel as if maybe there wasn't enough fluid in the reservoir or that maybe the device was flawed. But once again, patience and time, and now, compared to last month, I am longer and harder. Assumably, this will continue for some time and the results will continue to improve.
3. LIFESTYLE
Honesty is my true intention of anything I post on here. So here is the drawbacks that I can think of... The device doesn't self-inflate, so my sexual partner wont be able to "get me started" in a traditional manner. I start myself, she helps me finish (after I finish her 2, 3, or 4 times lol). Trading the ability for her to "get me started" for the ability to go longer than she can and ALWAYS be able to get it up... yeah, sign me the f*ck up right now! Prior to all this, about a year back , I was dating a girl who was absolutely gorgeous with a high sex drive... it felt like God was laughing in my face. Now, I feel like an idiot for ever letting myself get so down about it.
To this day, I hike, play sports (although ive put a hold on diving in volleyball lol), ride street bikes, dirt bikes, horses, bicycles, run, sit for long road trips, wrestle with idiot friends, make love, engage in rough sex, masturbate...etc. Some of these are subjective, so to give you an idea or physicality less than 3 months out, I played basketball last night and my fitness tracker said it was 2 hours and 8 minutes, with an average BPM of 173, and burned 1,982 calories. Not sure what a person would do that would be impossible, outside of a crotch kicking competition.
IN CONCLUSION
If you're recently implanted or thinking about it, post-op you may feel like you aren't as big as before, you may feel like you cant get rigid, you may feel like you're too sore to enjoy it when rigid... be patient. It comes back. Anything that doesn't come back, shouldn't be a big deal when you consider the trade-off. If you had no issues getting a natural erection, you wouldn't be here. So ask yourself, do I want a solution that allows me to be rock hard, go as long as my cardio will allow, and all with most if not all of the size you have now? IF the answer is yes, then welcome and hello my bionic brother
Sleeping positions for the first couple months are uncomfortable, so I laid on my back, now I sleep on my side again.
There are also fun things like wearing basketball shorts and catching people seeing you
Patience, patience, patience...
