Can Someone Help?......

[dadmo]

Dawn:
Sheinfeld did my son's RPLND and as others have said he is a master and your son will be fine. If you son has a chance have him do some lower back exercises. When they cut the stomach the lower back will do all of the body support, it's a common complaint after the RPLND to have sore back muscles.

[Fed]

Dawn,
My best friend trained under Joel Sheinfeld, and he concurs that although he is very old school, he's the best out there for this surgery (he does about 100-a-year!) Brian will be in great hands!

[DAWN82]

Dawn:
Sheinfeld did my son's RPLND and as others have said he is a master and your son will be fine. If you son has a chance have him do some lower back exercises. When they cut the stomach the lower back will do all of the body support, it's a common complaint after the RPLND to have sore back muscles.

AHAH... DADMO, BRIAN IS MY FIANCE, ITS OK, I AM SO HAPPY I AM HEARING SO MANY GOOD THINGS ABOUT THIS SURGEON

[boyce]

Advice

Sheinfeld will tell you all this too, but here's my lessons from this:

1) Walk. And Walk more..And then some more. I tried to walk every 1-2 hours for some period, and the very first lap took me almost 20 minutes...We could tell on the ward about how long it had been since peolpe's surguries by how much butt they had exposed while walking. Pace yourself and know that 1 or 2 laps is good! First day after I put in a mile (17 laps around the ward) with my heinie available for all the world to see and I didn't care a Bit! (Apologies to all who had to view said heinie) But by days 3 and 4, people are wearing robes and being more self-aware.
2) Use the morphine pump. It really is your friend. I weaned myself off at day 3, but have him use it as often and as long as necessary
3) Rest..you won't have much else to do, so rest up
4) Do the breathing thingee that you have to blow into the tube and float the plastic ball thing. I didn't do this enough, and with the Bleo I had and all, I struggled with getting enough air. It hurt like heck, but I should have done it more often.
5) Cold washcloths on the head helped me a lot! I'd walk a couple of laps and build up a sweat and be beat, and wasn't allowed to drink and a cold washcloth really helped.


The good news is that he'll feel a little better each day, as opposed to chemo where most of us felt worse as the week went on.

Oh! 1 more thing. I stunk. And I mean I Really stunk! Margaret gets a medal for even being near me. Anyway, on Day 5 post-op, I finally asked the nurse if there was anything they could do (Lysol, aerosol deodorant, Clorox, anything!) Turns out, I could have showered on day 2 post surgery and nobody told me! So ask about that, becasue that shower wsa a religious experience.

Also, you get some rest too! There are great nurses there that can care for his needs and he'll be sleeping a lot as well. You will have to help him when he gets home, so take care of yourself while he's in recovery!

We'll be sending our thoughts and prayers tomorrow for a greta result and a fast recovery! Please don't hesitate to ask anything at all, OK?

[dadmo]

Yup, my bad. Unfortunatly it doesn't change the stress level.

[MRMRSU]

Hi Dawn: Just wanted to wish you and Brian the best of luck tomorrow...can't offer any further advice than the great tidbits others have already posted for you here, but I wanted to send you happy thoughts anyway for a great day tomorrow. Be sure to take good care of yourself too.

[DAWN82]

Thank you Maria and everyone else for the boost!

i hope to be posting good new tomorrow when we return!

Dawn

[dannysbrother]

Hey Dawn,

Just noticed that Brian had 1 round of TIP before starting and completing BEP. Did the doctors explain why they opted to try TIP before BEP?

-M

[Already Bald]

Sheinfeld will tell you all this too, but here's my lessons from this:

1) Walk. And Walk more..And then some more. I tried to walk every 1-2 hours for some period, and the very first lap took me almost 20 minutes...We could tell on the ward about how long it had been since peolpe's surguries by how much butt they had exposed while walking. Pace yourself and know that 1 or 2 laps is good! First day after I put in a mile (17 laps around the ward) with my heinie available for all the world to see and I didn't care a Bit! (Apologies to all who had to view said heinie) But by days 3 and 4, people are wearing robes and being more self-aware.
2) Use the morphine pump. It really is your friend. I weaned myself off at day 3, but have him use it as often and as long as necessary
3) Rest..you won't have much else to do, so rest up
4) Do the breathing thingee that you have to blow into the tube and float the plastic ball thing. I didn't do this enough, and with the Bleo I had and all, I struggled with getting enough air. It hurt like heck, but I should have done it more often.
5) Cold washcloths on the head helped me a lot! I'd walk a couple of laps and build up a sweat and be beat, and wasn't allowed to drink and a cold washcloth really helped.


The good news is that he'll feel a little better each day, as opposed to chemo where most of us felt worse as the week went on.

Oh! 1 more thing. I stunk. And I mean I Really stunk! Margaret gets a medal for even being near me. Anyway, on Day 5 post-op, I finally asked the nurse if there was anything they could do (Lysol, aerosol deodorant, Clorox, anything!) Turns out, I could have showered on day 2 post surgery and nobody told me! So ask about that, becasue that shower wsa a religious experience.

Also, you get some rest too! There are great nurses there that can care for his needs and he'll be sleeping a lot as well. You will have to help him when he gets home, so take care of yourself while he's in recovery!

We'll be sending our thoughts and prayers tomorrow for a greta result and a fast recovery! Please don't hesitate to ask anything at all, OK?

Another little bit of RPLND advise,
I was having terrible headaches while recovering form the RPLND. The pain cut right through the morphine pump, even the washcloth on the forehead was of little help.
The nurses and fellows were reluctant to tell Sheinfeld, so they were trying to figure it out on their own. It was one smart nurse that asked me if I was a daily coffee drinker? "Yes, I am", was my answer- So she solved the headache riddle- caffeen withdrawal- unfortunately it was cured by....
Yes, you guessed it- Tylenol Suppositories.

[dannysbrother]

Boyce,

Danny and I enjoyed your heinie. Ahhh, those were the days...



-M

[DAWN82]

Yes The Heinie Thing Was Toooo Funny!!

[boyce]

Laqueshia's

Heinie got nuthin on mine.

() () () () ()

Doin' my rumpshaker thing!

OK ..I lied...Laqueshia's got a better one than me. I can admit it. People wave bills at me to put my clothes back on! - It's a nice supplement to the old income... made almost 50 bucks at the coffee shop just the other day!

[DAWN82]

Ahahahah... Thanks For Making Me Laugh, Yet Again!

[sldl1106]

Hey Dawn -

I haven't been on the board in a few days, I saw your post - we're kind of going through similar things, we met w. Dr. Sheinfeld LAST Thursday, and Rob had his first post-chemo scans last Monday. It's nerve-wracking, for sure, but you busy yourself with other things and let your heart pound when you make the phone call! The back pain being gone is a big indication, and his tumor marker number is great!

Rob had a burnt-out tumor in his testicle also. I don't know about dead tumors but I think they're easier than live ones... Dr. Sheinfeld said he has to probably remove Rob's left kidney "unless it is all dead tumor" (his words) because then he'll just have to pick it off the kidney, as opposed to removing live teratoma which has battered the kidney pretty badly.

Let me know when Brian's surgery is going to be... we may be meeting up while our fellas are recovering!! (Rob goes in for RPLND on Aug 8th).

If you need to stay in Manhattan while Brian has his surgery, call the Helmsley Medical Hotel as SOON as you know the dates. It's right across the street from Sloan and even though it's certainly not a luxury hotel, its perfect for what you need it for - sleeping and showering. It fills up quickly; I wasn't able to get it for us, but we stayed there alot during chemo.

Let us know how it goes tomorrow.

[Scott]

Yes, Danny still has yet to have his testicle removed.

I'm not surprised that they waited, but I am surprised that they're still waiting a year later. Wouldn't that be another likely reason for rising markers? When do you expect the orchiectomy to happen?