Radiotherapy requies the patient to present a full bladder and hold for the full treatment session.
I am looking advice and tips. The situation is that I can hold my water in the mid morning for over two hours. So I thought this requirement would be a breeze. I had no trouble with the trial run in the planning session which was mid morning. The the nurse gave me my appointment scdule. I was agast. The appoiments were for 3pm or 3:30pm. During that period I usually empty my bladder about every 45 minutes. I have done so for years. I have now done test runs aimed at the scheduled times. The best I have managed is 47 minutes from emptying my bladder to first leak, squirt actually. I had been managing to accept the pain for the last 9 minutes quite well. Thereafter i needed to empty my bladder at short intevals of between 23 minutes to 34. After managing just over an hour it is plain sailing again of about two hours.
I start radiotherapy on 30 October. I shall be very grateful for any tips I can try out in the few days I have left.
Hi George
for my radiotherapy sessions I had to arrive at the hospital at least an hour before the treatment. The plan was to arrive in the treatment room with a full bladder and empty rectum. So after arriving at the hospital I had to use suppositories and after going to the toilet drink a bottle of water. For me the system seemed to work reasonably OK. For a couple of treatments I was delayed when the radiotherapy machine was being serviced etc., when this happened we started the hour procedure again.
Surely if you discussed your problem with the Hospital they could give you morning appointments to fit your cycle. I found all of my radiologists kind and helpful, in fact they would stand outside the toilet and make sure it was free so I could go as soon as the treatment was finished. Whatever happens they will have been through much worse with other patients.
i must admit there is not much dignity in all of this, but keep thinking about the alternative.
i had a PSA result last week and thank goodness I am still zero, my testosterone is now normal, but I still get hot flushes through the night, hopefully they might eventually stop.
best wishes, will be thinking of you.
Keni
Thank you, Ken, for that helpful account. Knowing my waterworks habit I expressed my dismay to the nurse straight away. She said I could be rescheduled, but with such doubt and reluctance that I said I would try my practices with 3pm as the aim point. It now seems as hopeless as I then feared but I do not wish to give in yet. I would be unhappy to wait until say January or February to start the radiotherapy.
Hello George,
Don't be worrying about a minor detail as this is, yes minor in the big picture. First off this is old hat to the staff and they would just give you a couple of cups of tea or a bottle of water to drink if there was insuffient fluid in the bladder to carry on. The hospital may keep you waiting when you get there, shedules appointment times and the machinery having a hick up , or even the fire alarm going off and the place having to be evacuated!! are all feasible reasons for you not hopping up to the table at the appointed time. Please don't worry, a bladder is soon topped up.
If you get so worried that having a full bladder and holding may make you 'wait to long' and maybe not get to the bathroom in time, not a worry, you could buy a pack of incontinence pants to wear on the appointed day, very easily hidden under clothes ..... not the whole pack lol, this suggestion may take away that worry, our bladders are very sensitive to our emotions and the little devils play up, I know !! lol. Always a way round tho, and nothing the staff have not dealt with before.
wishing you well, and good appointment.
Jessie.
Jessie, that is super advice. Thank you.
What a fantastic picture, discretely wearing a pack of incontinence pads, jumbo ecconomy pack no doubt. No one would notice me shuffling along with crossed legs and the pack thumping up and down. But Jessie would there really be enough in the super size jumbo pack and I was really, really bursting?
Of course the thing to do is to try it. The experts are there and I am the novice. Thank you, Jessie.
Hello George,
You will be just fine, your wonderful sense of humour will help you and the fellow patients around you, don't ever lose it.
One time I was there, all had been done and was free to go to the 'rest' room, well it had been a while and I was in hurry, said room was at the orther end of the corridor ( of course ) the nurse shouted down the crowded corrider Coming through, clear a path , kind of her lol ! as I flew past her she yelled after me, ' Your gown isn't closed down the back ' me an me pert derriere promptly got the attention of all those in that long crowded corridor 
.
Give the humour free reign !
Jessie.
Oh I like that Jessie. Just sometimes robust helpfulness is not quite what we were looking for. It probably made the day for several sick people. Ooops you're not blushing again are you?
ohhh it was the walk back to the changing room that brought the blushes, did get a lot of smiles from folk !! I am one of lifes blushers even now as a pensioner I glow at the drop of a hat, the times I was in as a patient we used to joke that pride and dignity went out of the window, they just never took my red beam with them lol.
Forgive me for smiling yet. In my mind's eye I see the unkind gown . Those who witnessed the event may well remember your bright face beamimg your embarasment in reddest hue rather than the gown opening like a theater curtain. I find hospital nicities add to the embarasment: the gown not quite hiding: the sheet of paper perched on what is called in law the man's person . Such seem to lend focus and immenence to our vulnerabiliy to say nothing of our red faces. I remember all too well. I was in a hosital ward. My rectum had to be washed out in preparation for surgery - pijama top above and pigama bottom round my knees, and tube - you know exactly where - to squirt the water into my rectum. I was given a towelling face cloth to hide my 'person' I had to turn this way and that many times. Each time I rearranged the scrap of towelling I felt more rediculous.. At last I said to the young student nurse who was carrying out this procedure, "this is rediculous." and I threw the cloth aside. A moment later Sister appeared through the curtain, her face like thunder. Years later, I passed Sister in the street. Guess what was in my mind.
Hi George,
Thar's good advice in them there posts and plenty of time between now and 30/10 for you to relax and find neutral, Buddy. ( As one of your mechanics I don't want you over-revving between now and then ! ).
Of Course it is perfectly natural to be a little anxious now but please, take my word for it: You will do just fine. Come the day, you will discover what a non-event it is sensorially. And your control WILL be far better than you currently imagine it might be.
If it does become absolutely necessary, passing just a little into the toilet or a pad will relieve the urgency. You won't have to download a bucketful. And bear in mind, you will be in the Rad room <10 minutes anyway.
I was given to understand that the full bladder/ empty bowel regimen is specifically to lessen the side -effects of the RT to surrounding tissues. The efficacy of the treatment upon the tumour will not be impaired. In 42 sessions I reckon I was at optimal status for about 38 of them and 75% - 85% for the other 4. But, I still got clobbered with Rad Proctitis and Urethral Strictures anyway. So I guess what I'm saying is do your best but don't over-stress it. You do your best and whatever eventuates you take it on the chin. You have to. When you are in there on a regular basis you will see, as I did, so many things that will confirm to you, how lucky you are.
Hang in there George, you WILL be O.K.
Best Regards
Dudley
Thank you. Yes I understand the empty bowel and the full bladder are to less the side effects. Thank you for your expaqnations and encouragement. I am now running a test as I write. Notional therapy time 15;00 and it is now 15:35. No full feeling, No pain. Si I shall post a general reply to report of my tests.
Thank you again for boosting me along.
Thank you everybody for your great support and ideas. I also harnased my wife on this one. Years ago she had a very rough time giving birth. that gave her waterworks trouble on and off ever since so she too is an expert.
Hypothesis 1: I shifted the time I took my blood pressure pills. A modest improvement. Crisis and leak (squirt actually) 4 minutes into notional therapy time.
So we did some much harder thinking.
Hypothesis 2: move after lunch nap to morning to end not later than 2 hours 45 minutes before the start time of therapy. Yes I really did calculate that interval from data I already had.
Test 1- held water for 2 hours 10 minutes after therapy start time
Test 2- held water for 1 hour 56 minutes
Test 3- (now) still holding water at 55 minutes and not feeling full.
Yes the 40 minutes needed for drinking my 750cl and waiting for my bladder to fill before therapy must be added on to the above times. Looks like I wont need that giant economy size of incontinent pads after all.
Thank you all for your help and encouragement.
Hi Dudley,
I am very sorry that you have picked up the heavy end of the log of side effects. I hope these troublesome things are of the acute sort and will pass in a few weeks or months. In PCa the timescales are so drawn out. Accute to my mind indicates a mtter of a few days of intense trouble. But fir us, a stranger would be forgiven for thinking we have a chronic problem. So I hope they are the accue variety. One can hardly bear to think of the chronic variety, if we must we must. PCa calls for massive stores of fortitude and endurance. We should all be given character tests before being assigned to the rugged journey that is PCa.
So I must learn from your good sence and kindness and speak truth with love as I find opportunity. For I must comfort and encourage you as you have so ably ministered to me.
Your friend in PCa adversity
George
Nice to hear from you George. As I have mentioned I consider I am doing pretty well thanks, all things considered. I'm just taking things one day at a time. Thankful, for having over all a less sinister future for a while and not resentful of the price paid along the way. Nothing, is for nothing. I am confident my Medicos have done and are trying to do their best. And so am I.
Thank you, Dudley. That is bravely and honourably spoken. I will remember it.
--------------- was about to reply, however, I shall trot fofftt and leave this domain of men to you Menfolk.
I wish all of you Good Health for the future.
Kiss on the cheek George x
Warm regards
Jessie.