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I was 41 years old when I had my first prostate exam. I stayed up all night studying for the exam and passed with flying colors. Actually, I went to the ER with a pain in the butt after a heavy day of snowboarding. A surgeon was helping in the ER that day and he diagnosed me with hemorrhoids. While checking out the hemorrhoids, he also checked my prostate for my first time. Three weeks later, he did a hemorrhoidectomy.
A few years later, a colorectal surgeon did a prostate exam before a colonoscopy.
Starting at age 53, I had annual prostate exams because of my enlarged prostate that made it hard to empty my bladder. The urologist put me on Flomax to supposedly make it easier to pee, but it didn't really help much. At age 58, the urologist performed a prostate-reduction surgery (TURP) and a week later after the nurse removed the catheter, I promptly got a bladder infection and then sepsis and was hospitalized for three days while I came close to dying, but pulled through it, apparently. My wife was terrified that I would die because her mom and her aunt both died of sepsis after they had bladder infections.
In the past 10 years since the TURP surgery, I've seen the urologist once or twice a year and she has probably a prostate exam every other year.
The doctors always seem to apologize just before the prostate exam, maybe because they assume most men are embarrassed or the exam is uncomfortable. With my love for anal play, it's always a pleasure. I felt like saying to my female urologist, "Hey, doc, I'll give you 20 minutes to stop doing that. Make it 30 minutes. Tell you what. Just go another 45 minutes and charge me for a comprehenisve exam."
In total, I've had about 12 prostate exams in the last 27 years, but who's counting?
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