The thing about prostate cancer, the really annoying thing about this potential killer, is that of all the cancers you can get — if you are going to get one, of course — this is probably the best. It’s slow burning, which is good because you can do something about it if you are diagnosed early. If you discover it early, it is curable. However, these two positives go hand in hand in creating an annoying issue. Because of the ‘curability’ factor, you go from someone who has cancer to someone who had had cancer quite quickly.
Confused about how this relates to sexual function and activity? Stay with me.
You will find that during your time someone who has this cruel disease you are the focus of attention, and quite rightly so. Yet, when the offending article is removed, i.e. the prostate gland, you suddenly become the survivor. The lucky b*****d who dodged that particular bullet. You can breathe a sigh of relief, count your blessing and get on with the rest of your life.
Right? Well… No.
What you do not see — the thing that no one sees — is the fact that, at some point during this journey you got scared. Scared of dying — of losing everything.
Coming face-to-face with your own mortality tends to strip away everything you once were, leaving you trying to act out the person who died along with your confidence and manhood. For the removal of ‘the cancer’ also took away your ability to father a child, and in many cases, the ability to maintain or even produce an erection.
Oops. Yes, there I said it. An erection. A hard-on. A stiffy. Deal with it.
Whatever you were capable of has now been taken from you, but that’s okay, isn’t it? Men are supposed to be better equipped to deal with emotional loss. In fact, men are supposed to be too basic to have the deeper emotions needed to feel any sort of depression at not being able to perform.
You might have had all the kids you were going to have. Sewn all the wild oats you were going to sew and, to be honest, the once a month ritual of muted lovemaking won’t be missed all that much. I mean, you are both getting on a bit now… You’re supposed to stop with the sex after you’ve reached 60, aren’t you?
A number of women I’ve spoken to have said the change in their husbands after prostate cancer is beyond dramatic. It’s as though one person went into the operating theatre and another came out. They describe a man who is unsure of himself, whose confidence is veneer thin at best. They seem to have lost interest in things — especially, their wives.
This is not true. This man, has just danced with Death and has lost so much. Things you cannot see. His self-esteem, his manhood, and his ability (in his mind) to satisfy the one woman he has had by his side for so long… And if he can’t satisfy his partner, there’s the voice of doubt ready to plant its seed about where they might go to get satisfaction.
Women the world over are crying, ‘Rubbish!’ and they are right. Your husbands know you better than that. However, when he is being told ‘how lucky’ he is to be alive and ‘how grateful’ he should be it’s probably a sure bet he’s feeling neither lucky nor grateful. He might feel cheated though.
A friend of mine was having these issues. Before the operation, both she and her husband had enjoyed regular, if predictable, sex. She said their lovemaking only varied between whose turn it was to go on top.
John* had had a close call. Being a typical man, and yes, such a beast does exist, he ignored certain signs that would indicate that he had a problem. It wasn’t until he visited his doctor on a totally unrelated issue that it was discovered he was very close to ‘buying the farm’. His PSA (prostate-specific antigen) levels were through the roof and within a month of diagnosis, John was in the hospital having his prostate removed. Unfortunately, quite a lot of surrounding tissue had to be removed too, along with a nerve that controlled his erections.
Jane* said sex wasn’t everything. Later she confided in me that it was folly to assume sex was nothing. Cracks began to show, and the feeling of resentment John held towards his predicament heightened after their first attempt at sex, post operation. Nothing happened. John’s penis didn’t seem to react to any stimulus, although he could still achieve an orgasm, it was only via rubbing a certain area of his penis, which still remained flaccid.
So came the mantra of ‘Sex isn’t everything’. Three words that slowly turned sour in John’s mind.
Jane could see the change in their sex life bothered him. She could see he was in pain, mentally. He tried to carry on as normal, but as the weeks went by Jane noticed John had becaome more distant and less tactile. She decided to take the initiative — because the alternative was to sit back and watch their marriage dissolve.
As her friend, I tried to get Jane to see things from her husband’s perspective. She formed a plan. A few weeks after we’d been speaking, I asked Jane how things were going, and her response was one that surprised me.
“I did what all women are good at,” she said. “I went shopping!”
*Names have been changed to protect the couple’s identity.
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