For anyone facing this surgery this section will hopefully help you with what to expect. I was able to stand in the hospital just after surgery with only a quite severe pain in my side. No real pain at incision site at this time. Was able to walk to bro‘s car and get in OK. Fortunately the drive home was a short one only taking around 5 minutes. I say fortunately because going over bumps was certainly not pleasant.
Once home I got into bed and whilst there and staying still the pain was minimal if existent at all, which was the case for the whole recovery. I found laying down the best and didn’t do much sitting expect for on the toilet. On day one the main pains were encountered getting up and down to make bathroom visits which was about all I was capable of doing. I will mention for the whole recovery I never took anything more than paracetamol and put marijuana Kief in my coffee and soup, the second of these is not for all im aware, but having been a smoker since the age of 15 I had quit after the GP appointment and decided adding withdrawal symptoms along with nicotine withdrawal symptoms during recovery was probably not the best idea. The point been the pain was never what I would describe as bad and should be bearable for most especially considering available pain meds go up to say a level 10 and I was on the first rung of the ladder mostly. The pain did worsen on day 2 once the strong painkillers administered for surgery had worn off. I realised they were still very much in my system day 1 evening when before going to sleep I was talking to my dad who was stood in my bedroom doorway with a giant halo around his head. But from then on each day got better.
The days following were all around the same and for the first 3 days I took only paracetamol. On day three I finally felt brave enough to change the dressing and noticed some redness. This worsened on day 4 so I called the GP under the advice from my bro that is was likely infected. Had a video appointment with the GP due to the corona situation and he agreed and prescribed antibiotics. The next 4 - 5 days the pain in my side subsided and became focused more on the incision site. For me I did suffer quite a severe pain in my side whilst standing and sitting but I don’t believe this is common. After 5 days with only spots of leakage on my dressing I woke to a completely soaked dressing and yellow puss all over the place. This continued for around three days but this is simply a sign of the antibiotics doing their jobs sending the white blood cells to the area to deal with the infection. The stuff coming out was like if you pop a spot, blood is present but it’s mostly mixed with yellow nastiness. Please be advised if you are not sure and suspect it is blood and actually bleeding, take no chances and call the doctors immediately as you absolutely do not want any actual blood to be coming from the wound, this would be very bad. After around 4 days of leakage and the day before my first appointment in Leeds the wound healed like I was wolverine and made massive strides forward.
This whole process took two weeks as that was the length of time between surgery and follow up appointment. So given that I was unlucky enough to have infection also, the healing time is not bad at all. I had even driven several times and maintained a good level of mobility throughout. I would say it took around 4 weeks total for all the soreness to go and to return to normality.
i would like to pay special mention to what is called the grape. It is common in the area where the testicle was removed for a blood clot called a hematoma to form. No one ever mentioned this and that is echoed on all the forums where I was able to find out about it. For me http://www.tc-cancer.com/forum/index.php was a massive source of info and strength and the community there are super knowledgeable and more than happy to answer any question you have. Any way the grape, this is a circular mass of dead tissue that will grow slightly higher than where your buddy was removed. It can almost feel like it has regrown miraculously or that they fit a prosthetic, which in my case I had refused due to the increased risk of infection. Guess that didn’t work out well, but to me I would not want a silicone implant in that region and didn’t in any way feel any mental issues around losing one of the two. However for some this can effect how they feel as a man and the implant may be the right move but this can always be done at a later date also. This grape will eventually be absorbed by the body in the following months and eventually go all together.
So overall surgery and recovery are not worth any stress at all, not a major undertaking I would say and if anything you get a scar which are always sexy and the excuse to have people run around for you for a week or two. So if you have to partake in the operation, in which case my apologies for joining the club, but don’t waste any time pre op worrying about it.