Limbo and a welcome visit

I'm halfway through the period from my first Prostap injection to the next one in mid June. I'm really impatient to find out if the treatment is working but won't really know until I get the results of the next PSA test which will be taken at the same session that I get the next Prostap injection. It is frustrating because I don't see much change in my symptoms. At least not as much as I would have hoped. I still need to get up three times a night and often need two attempts to empty my bladder. I also get the same, low level, discomfort in my lower back.

Just after Easter my parents, brother, other brother's widow and her son came up to visit. This took a bit of organising and increased my wife's stress levels somewhat. She coped with the stress by taking charge of what would happen here. I'd not noticed this coping strategy before, but I'm sure it is not new to her. In the past I would have matched her assertiveness with assertiveness of my own but the treatment had an effect and I just didn't have the energy to put my own case forward. On the Easter Monday, things came to a head with me feeling bullied [this is the nearest I can get to describing my feelings at the time but it is not absolutely accurate]. My wife could tell I was not my usual self and insisted I tell what was wrong. This was difficult because I didn't really have the right words and I knew that if I actually started talking about it I was going to be tearful. She insisted and I told her, between sobs, that I felt bullied. That I knew that she was not bullying me but that this was the best I could describe the feelings. This occurred mid morning and it was not until late evening that I began to feel better.

In the event things went very well. My parents travelled up bu coach to join my brother, nephew and sister in law in Milton Keynes where they had been staying with my niece and her family over Easter and they drove up here Tuesday afternoon. They had an evening meal with my youngest son and his fiancée and stayed in the Travel Lodge over night. On Wednesday morning they came over and, once my youngest son arrived we went into the village for a coffee (to give my wife some quiet time to herself). My elder son was to join us there but he turned up late and missed us. Then back home for a light lunch. Youngest son skipped this but elder son joined us. We had a pleasant time together and, I hope, my parents left less worried about me than when they arrived.

They all left late afternoon to drive the 280 or so miles back to Ramsgate and they were home by 22:30 despite an incident in Leek where a van shot out from the oncoming traffic, clipped their wing mirror and smashed into the following car. The incident involved police, ambulance, fire brigade and an air ambulance. This added about a half an hour to their journey time.

A small milestone

Monday I finished the course of Cyproterone Acetate tablets so now my treatment is just the Prostap. The only side effect I noticed from the tablets was some breathlessness. Hopefully, now they are finished, this will cease. There is also some potential for side effects from the Prostap. There are a couple that appear to be affecting me. The first is loss of sex drive and erectile dysfunction. This is not a big deal for me or my wife, fortunately. The other side effect is diarrhoea but this may be down more to my changed diet rather than to the treatment. Again, it is not a problem because it is not the sort of diarrhoea associated with food poisoning or a stomach bug where one dares not stray far from a lavatory. Rather it is just that when I move my bowels the stools are very loose.

Also on Monday I finished reading Professor Jane Plant's book Prostate Cancer: Understand, Prevent and Overcome. This is where the change of diet comes in. Mostly I am very sceptical of diets that claim to prevent disease or give one big health benefits. I've been of the opinion that a balanced diet is enough along with not consuming more calories than are burnt off. However, Jane Plant appears to have researched the subject of her book very thoroughly and has references to peer reviewed scientific research to back up her reasoning and conclusions. This is enough to persuade me that it is worth following her advice, even though, for me, it is too late to prevent prostate cancer.

I have also been perusing another of her books written jointly with Gill Tidey: The Plant Programme; recipes for fighting breast and prostate cancer. The diet is based largely on Chinese diets because in China (except in some cities where western diets are becoming more popular) prostate and breast cancer is practically non-existent. Dairy products are not used in China and animal protein is a very small amount of the total diet. The authors propose a scoring system for types of food ranging from 0 to 10. Those with active cancer (like me) should have a score of no more than 4 for any meal and no more than 15-20 for a day, averaged out over a week to allow for treats. Those on a prevention or maintenance programme should have only one meal a day scoring more than 5 and a total score per day of 30-35 averaged out over a week. The scores are as follows:

Fresh fruit and vegetable juices and salads	0
Soya "milk" and "yoghurt", nuts, dried fruits, uncooked grains and bean curd (tofu)	1
Mixed cooked and raw vegatables and fruit	2
Cooked vegatables, fruit, grains and cooked dried pulses	3
Canned beans, vegatables, Soya "cream"	4
Dominantly vegatables with eggs	5
Dominantly vegetables, with chicken, duck, fish, and seafood	6
Dominantly vegetables, with lamb, pork, rabbit, venison	7
Dominantly egg	8
Dominantly chicken, duck, fish, and seafood	9
Dominantly lamb, pork, rabbit, venison	10

The Plant Programme has a large number of recipe suggestions organised under meal types, breakfast, snacks, main meals. There is also advice about eating away from home. So far I am finding it quite easy to 15 points per day, especially averaged over the week.

Both books are well worth a read and should be readily available for purchase from the usual sources as well as for loan from your local library.