Cycling - A real pain in my ass!

[Flounder]

I’m in my 7th week of cycling. In the first couple weeks of recovery, my perineum hurt and sitting was very difficult. That gradually went away along with the scrotal swelling & discomfort. But since I started cycling, I get intense pain at the perineum (A-hole to the base of the shaft) The pain seems to concentrate in the pelvic floor but also radiates around my butt making sitting difficult. I can affect it by flexing the Kegel muscles.

This has been going on for 7 weeks now with only marginal improvement. The pain intensifies the longer I hold the inflation. I expected shaft and tip pain during early cycling. However, pain tolerance in my pelvic floor is what actually determines when I call time on cycling. As soon as I deflate, the pain subsides to an ache that usually fades away in a few hours. I found that a walk after cycling helps to chase the discomfort.

Just curious if anyone else has experienced this? This is something I wanted to discuss at my 90day follow up with the doctor but that’s on hold for now.

[SWorks17]

Flounder,
I had a lot of pain in the shaft of my penis at that time when fully inflated after about 20 minutes and then I would have to deflate to stop the pain. I don’t remember having pain in the perineum area, but I did have pain and numbness in my scrotum area from the surgery and the stitches.
I do remember that I would have pain and tightness in that area when trying to tie my shoes. I used a lot of ice packs.
I talked to a lot of FrankTalk guys too and most didn’t have the pain that I had during those weeks.
I’m a road bike cyclist, so I’ve had pain in that area when I use to have a bad bike saddle and it would cause my perineum to get numb and painful. I think road cycling was one of the causes of ED but I did have other issues with BPH, and maybe cholesterol could have contributed too.
I would definitely talk to the doc about this pain.
I did a lot of warm sits baths to help with swelling and pain, while inflating to maximum inflation. It wasn’t an overnight thing, I kept cycling the implant and pushing myself through the pain as much as I could. It kept getting better, but I would have setbacks.
I hope the pain gets better soon.
Im now 14 months out and I can pump it to rock hard for over an hour with no pain.

Good Luck,
SWorks 17

[Artpe54]

I’ve never had any issues with cycling.

[KeithC]

I’m in my 7th week of cycling. In the first couple weeks of recovery, my perineum hurt and sitting was very difficult. That gradually went away along with the scrotal swelling & discomfort. But since I started cycling, I get intense pain at the perineum (A-hole to the base of the shaft) The pain seems to concentrate in the pelvic floor but also radiates around my butt making sitting difficult. I can affect it by flexing the Kegel muscles.

This has been going on for 7 weeks now with only marginal improvement. The pain intensifies the longer I hold the inflation. I expected shaft and tip pain during early cycling. However, pain tolerance in my pelvic floor is what actually determines when I call time on cycling. As soon as I deflate, the pain subsides to an ache that usually fades away in a few hours. I found that a walk after cycling helps to chase the discomfort.

Just curious if anyone else has experienced this? This is something I wanted to discuss at my 90day follow up with the doctor but that’s on hold for now.

Yes I have experienced the same discomfort. It only happens when I sit in certain positions and not always when pumped up. It’s not severe and it doesn’t last long for me. Just noticeable and annoying.

Please post what your doctor says about it.

[newbie443]

I’m in my 7th week of cycling. In the first couple weeks of recovery, my perineum hurt and sitting was very difficult. That gradually went away along with the scrotal swelling & discomfort. But since I started cycling, I get intense pain at the perineum (A-hole to the base of the shaft) The pain seems to concentrate in the pelvic floor but also radiates around my butt making sitting difficult. I can affect it by flexing the Kegel muscles.

This has been going on for 7 weeks now with only marginal improvement. The pain intensifies the longer I hold the inflation. I expected shaft and tip pain during early cycling. However, pain tolerance in my pelvic floor is what actually determines when I call time on cycling. As soon as I deflate, the pain subsides to an ache that usually fades away in a few hours. I found that a walk after cycling helps to chase the discomfort.

Just curious if anyone else has experienced this? This is something I wanted to discuss at my 90day follow up with the doctor but that’s on hold for now.

I have not read of this for some time but it was brought up a lot in the past. Men felt pain like they were setting on something hard because that is just what they were doing. The hard RTE end of the implant was the hard "rock" that we are setting on. And you adjust to that over time. Just like in the first part of your post. The second part about cycling and the location of the pain was somewhat like I was having. My pain though was triggered at full inflation having sex. My girlfriend was aggressive with giving me a hand job during foreplay and the motion in or down on my penis wold cause pain and It would be a problem for several days afterwards. I even had to be careful with masturbation and pull out rather than in. I also had a left pointing angle. \ instead of I. Could be a right angle / if the right proximal cylinder caused the perforation. My cause was a proximal perforation by my left cylinder. Not saying that is what you have as you said your pain gets better rather than lasting like mine did and you have not said anything about the angle. If you are worried that you may be causing a perforation you can ease off a bit on the cycling. If you are doing 2 times a day just skip a day and on the evening of the second day start back once a day and see if that lets it heal. You might want to put a call in to your doctor and run that by him/her.

Good luck going forward with this.

[Tokyo_123]

I’ve never had any issues with cycling.

Ditto

[Flounder]

I have not read of this for some time but it was brought up a lot in the past. Men felt pain like they were setting on something hard because that is just what they were doing. The hard RTE end of the implant was the hard "rock" that we are setting on. And you adjust to that over time. Just like in the first part of your post. The second part about cycling and the location of the pain was somewhat like I was having. My pain though was triggered at full inflation having sex. My girlfriend was aggressive with giving me a hand job during foreplay and the motion in or down on my penis wold cause pain and It would be a problem for several days afterwards. I even had to be careful with masturbation and pull out rather than in. I also had a left pointing angle. \ instead of I. Could be a right angle / if the right proximal cylinder caused the perforation. My cause was a proximal perforation by my left cylinder. Not saying that is what you have as you said your pain gets better rather than lasting like mine did and you have not said anything about the angle. If you are worried that you may be causing a perforation you can ease off a bit on the cycling. If you are doing 2 times a day just skip a day and on the evening of the second day start back once a day and see if that lets it heal. You might want to put a call in to your doctor and run that by him/her.

Good luck going forward with this.

Thanks for the informative response. I Google researched “proximal perforation” and it seems like there are some similarities with my pain symptoms at the perineum/pelvic floor region. The pain is triggered by approx. inflation of 75% <. When I said it’s slowly improving, I meant in the amount of time I can remain inflated until the pain becomes unbearable. It also seems to subside a little faster after I deflate. However the pain still reaches an unbearable level, currently at about 30 minutes, even with Tylenol. Strangely I have little shaft or glans pain when cycling. It’s the internal pain in the pelvic floor that controls the length of time I can remain inflated. I don’t have a L or R angle as you mentioned but the pain seems concentrated on the left side. I don’t have any RTE’s so that can’t be the source of the problem.

Unfortunately my doctor (Eid) is currently on medical leave so contacting him isn’t an option as you suggested. I’m hesitant to get another doctor involved but may have to.

Question; How was your proximal perforation diagnosed? Was it something that could be seen with MRI or some other form of imaging?

[FinallyBionic]

I used to feel pain after when cycling when I was activated. This pain started at about 15 mins, then at about 6 months, it was at 45 mins, and gradually reached one hour. One year after my implant, I could stay inflated for 2 hours without pain.
My suggestion is to wait. It is too early to worry about. Dr. Eid is an expert. If you don't see any improvement during the next 3 or 4 months, you might need to contact your doctor, or any experienced one if Eid isn't back to work.

[Flounder]

I used to feel pain after when cycling when I was activated. This pain started at about 15 mins, then at about 6 months, it was at 45 mins, and gradually reached one hour. One year after my implant, I could stay inflated for 2 hours without pain.
My suggestion is to wait. It is too early to worry about. Dr. Eid is an expert. If you don't see any improvement during the next 3 or 4 months, you might need to contact your doctor, or any experienced one if Eid isn't back to work.

In my case, the pain in the perineum/pelvic floor is noticeable as soon as I start inflating and continues to intensify. It’s much more prominent than the stretching discomfort I feel in the shaft and glans. It seems like the proximal tips are pressing inwards, irritating something, whenever the implant is inflated.

I have decided to tough it out as long as I can wait to see what develops with Dr. Eid’s situation. The purpose of my post was to hear if anyone else experienced recurrent pain, specifically in the perineum/pelvic floor area, following inflatable implant surgery. It’s a topic I haven’t seen discussed here before.

[newbie443]

Unfortunately my doctor (Eid) is currently on medical leave so contacting him isn’t an option as you suggested. I’m hesitant to get another doctor involved but may have to.

Question; How was your proximal perforation diagnosed? Was it something that could be seen with MRI or some other form of imaging?

I had trouble getting help with this as my local doctors do not do repairs or replacement surgery. They only do the Implant or removal. I complained of the pain to my gastro doc and they did a CT scan. The results was a report by the person that reviewed the scan that there was no perforation. And there was none of the intestine. I was able to get a copy of the CT scan and see a difference in the RTE's. I did take this to my urologist as my insurance permits me to go out of area for a procedure that is not done by doctors in my coverage area. Insurance would not permit a replacement device as the well known doctors including your doctor that I tried to get to do the repair. Insurance did Ok going to a doctor at a teaching hospital that did not replace my device but was able to do a repair.

That doctor used me for a teaching lesson for his students. If I used my fingers to "feel" the cylinders going down my scrotum and into my perineum, I could feel a big difference. My left cylinder where the pain is was much shallower and the RTE end was the location of the pain or when deflated very close. I told the teaching doctor this and he felt this and had about a half dozen of his students/residence also feel this.

FinallyBionic has some good advice. Try giving things a break like I posted earlier. If you are cycling twice a day skip a day and return with once a day. It took me over 3 years to get a doctor to do a sling repair. Doctors are very reluctant to do another surgery before 6 months post implant. This is because scar tissue takes a long time to heal and will not hold stiches well. My sling repair did not stop the pain. It reduced it by 1/2 and the cylinders are now the same when I follow them through my scrotum and into my perineum. I was able to have sex with the perforation during those 3 years. The angle limited or determined the positions we could use. The angle is also now about 1/2 what it was. The point is that it worked. It is better after another surgery but surgeries are not a lot of fun. It would have been a really difficult choice for me to go back knowing the outcome I have now. Not sure a 50% improvement was worth the trouble. My left cylinder was removed and a stirrup was made with suture thread passed through the RTE to support the end of the cylinder. Not a perfect outcome that I had thought I paid out of pocket for in my first surgery. But it works and I was able to use it even before the repair.

So do what you can to get by until the 5 month point. Then you can start thinking about it you want another surgery or not. Infection risk is higher for additional IPP surgery. This is because a bio film that surrounds all the components of the device can contain massive amounts of germs. My repair doctor had me receive 2 bags of IV antibiotics (one after the other) prior to surgery. He also cultured the fluid inside the bio film of all the components he disturbed. This was to be able to determine if and what meds I would need to prevent infection. Bottom line is if it works and you can make do with it another surgery may be better off to wait until the device fails.

Of course you always need to be watchful for infection. and if it is too painful for sex and you cannot find workable solutions then that is a different thing.

Good luck going forward with this.