A rhetorical question

[birdgirl73]

I don't think I can be objective with this question, THCBongman. I have a 20-year-old son, and if he were facing the same situation you are, I'd be on my knees, begging and pleading with him to have the surgery. I also think it's hard for a woman to be able to really address this area anyway, but as a mom, I see why your family wants you to have it. I know you've been through hell. There's no guarantee, of course, that you won't go through hell of some type whether you have it or not. I would just hope that you'd take every chance at living a longer life. I'm so sorry you're faced with this.

[Stoner Shadow Wolf]

i am a firm believe in nature and letting it take it's course, i do not completely agree with medicine, however, natural treatment, and mind over matter are tolerable. pharmaceuticals, and surgery, in my opinion, are an abomination of nature.

[birdgirl73]

i am a firm believe in nature and letting it take it's course, i do not completely agree with medicine, however, natural treatment, and mind over matter are tolerable. pharmaceuticals, and surgery, in my opinion, are an abomination of nature.

So would you elect, then, not to have surgery or, say, antibiotics if you had a ruptured appendix? Or a surgically curable form or cancer? Or a surgically removable brain tumor that, without surgery, would kill you but with surgery would allow you to live out your natural lifespan? You would object to unnatural abominations and take an untested natural approach over one that could certainly cure you? (Here I'm not saying THCBongman is facing a certain cure in his case, but there are plenty of cases where certain cures are sure things, and he knows his chances are much greater if he does have this surgery.) This sort of logic always astounds me when I read it.

[Stoner Shadow Wolf]

only for myself, i believe in respecting the free will of others.


although i already had my appendix removed, there's nothing i can do to change that... and it was before i really formed any opinions on the matter.


and as for your natural lifespan, if you have a curable but deadly disease, your natural lifespan is reduced. curing disease lets us live an unnatural lifespan. i vouch for natural selection, but i wont enforce that on anyone but myself.


though, if friends and/or family cannot cope with losing me, i will gladly put their feelings ahead of my own. no sense in complete arrogance.

[Dave Byrd]

OK, speaking as a physician in circulatory medicine and an older man than you are, I gotta tell you that, from a medical perspective, normal sexual function isnt a guarantee to anyone, no matter what their medical history. So you can fall on your sword of nobility and choose to not have surgery and live only three or four more years in what you think is going to be a functional state (and what you think is going to be a functional state when you're past 40 is a lot different from what your imagination is now, most likely), or you can have surgery and live longer than if you tanked within four years and have whatever sexual function is granted to you, which is how it's going to be anyway as you age unless you're compulsive about your circulatory health.

My point is it comes down to whether you want to die sooner than later. Sexual function tends to decline as men get older. And wives and girlfriends are a lot more likely to overlook problems in that area, anyway. What's a big deal to you isn't always a big thing to them. They're about a lot more than how the sex is. They care about how the relationship is.

You're going to get suffering either way. Don't kid yourself. If you have the surgery now and have to face that recovery, sure, you're going to have pain and recovery and potential changes. But you will recover and get the chance to live a longer life, father kids (even it it's through artificial insem), feel the sensation of orgasm, and see what middle and older age is like. You know that's what's more likely.

But if you choose not to have the surgery and let the cancer take its course, you're going to endure suffering a lot sooner. Not pretty, heroic, noble suffering. Miserable, painful, early suffering. I just watched my sister inlaw die three months ago. It's not pretty. You may have a pleasant period before then, but that's what it'll be, a temporary period.

So I hope that makes sense. I may have been a little blunt, but that's how I am.

[Weedhound]

Wow, Go Dave!

[Knucklecallus420]

kills my heart

[thcbongman]

Well, reading what you guys had to say, thank you BG, Dave, and Weedhound for your perspectives and advice. I guess you knocked a little sense into me. Somehow Lance Armstrong won 7 Tour de France, which is pretty amazing, so life afterwards can't all that bad. I'm leaning towards surgery, although something I don't want to fantom.

I guess what moved me most was reading Xcrispi's post about his explosion. We each suffer in our ways, and my life could be much worse, but it's pretty damn good, despite all this. Thank you guys.

[Blazed and Confused]

Think about it, you are contemplating opting out of surgery to avoid the hassles treatment and recovery. If you do so, you said you will most likely get cancer in 3-5 years, at which point you will need chemo and other treatments. So you are just delaying the inevitable.

[mfqr]

Think about it, you are contemplating opting out of surgery to avoid the hassles treatment and recovery. If you do so, you said you will most likely get cancer in 3-5 years, at which point you will need chemo and other treatments. So you are just delaying the inevitable.

No, he says he would want to live out his life without that hassle. That is the point--go through surgery, or don't. This means he wouldn't go through chemo as well. I don't really know what to say to you, thcbongman. Personally I think I would just live the rest of my life to the fullest. But I don't know if I should suggest that either. It's a very hard decision, dude.