I’ve posted on here, many of you know our story. Here’s a brief rundown:
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Vasectomy 4 years ago (May 2014) - initial procedure very painful, then the pain just never went away. Hubby just…never healed.
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Reversal 3 years ago (May 2015) - no change in pain whatsoever. We thought he was doing better initially but about 4-6 weeks after the reversal the pain came back and we decided it must’ve been the cord block they administered during surgery that provided the temporary relief.
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Meds tried: gabapentin, Norco, Hydro, Oxy, two kinds of anti-depressants (Celexa and one other). Also tried several tumeric based natural supplements, CBD in multiple forms. Also Flomax for he thought might be prostate issues. He is not currently taking any pain meds, he is taking one natural treatment that only works a little and is really expensive.
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Non-medicinal treatment: pelvic floor therapy, an experimental nerve therapy, some accupuncture.
Daily pain: Hubby is in noticeable, distrating pain every single day, he is never without it. I’d say he operates at a 4-5 most days. He’d say 3-4, and some days that’s accurate, but most days it’s higher. The pain cycles and some weeks (like this week) he’s closer to an 8 or higher.
Nothing he has tried has made the pain stop, except the expensive nerve therapy. That was thousands of dollars, and through a series of delays in treatment (holidays, weather, etc) the pain came roaring back full force and we realized it wasn’t an actual solution, just a temporary fix. The doctor was over an hour away, it required daily treatment at $100/day, and it didn’t provide enough benefit to really call it successful. On top of all that, the commute time in the care undid half of anything that had been accomplished during the treatment. He’d be gone 4 hours, come home and sleep 2-3 hours, and we just couldn’t see the long-term benefit.
None of the meds or suplementals have provided actual relief, most haven’t done anything except make him sleep a lot. The antidepressants made him dizzy and nauseated. The CBD products made him feel mentally detached from the pain (which he did not like) but didn’t lessen the actual pain.
Everything aggravates his pain: sitting for too long, standing for too long, driving, walking, lifting, playing with our kids, laying on his side if he doesn’t have a pillow between his knees. Sex is a 50/50 because the pain hinders him from being able to complete. But even if everything does go as it’s supposed to, that often makes the pain flare up.
Type of pain: Hubby describes it as two-fold: congestive type pain and nerve pain. Sometimes he says he is tender to the touch and feels swollen in the testicle area and he thinks that more congestive. Sometimes the pain radiates all the way up into his torso or is sharp and very internal, and we classify that as nerve pain. On bad weeks, his face is drawn and pale, he is in a constant squint/grimace, and he’s miserable. Those weeks he sleeps more and has to lay down more.
The pain often causes insomnia and his sleep schedule gets crazy - no matter what he tries, he can’t fall asleep before 3 or 4am, and then he sleeps until 11am. He doesn’t even try to mess with pain meds anymore, and sleep aids like Tylenol PM or Unisom don’t help. Sometimes he can drink a beer or have a little whiskey to help him sleep but more often than not that doesn’t even work. (He’s not a heavy drinker at all). It’s a vicious cycle because I know his body needs a regular sleep rhythym, but everything gets all topsy turvy and starts to unravel.
Lastly, Hubby has been talking about a partial removal - I think it’s an orchioctomy…I know I’m not spelling that right…but really it’s probably just a shot in the dark. Denervation makes us both leery because of his bad experience with surgery. The time between the initial vasectomy and the reversal was almost exactly a year, and yet the doc said there was so much scar tissue present when he did the reversal that he guessed that we were 15 years out from the initial v, not 1. I don’t know what that means but obviously Hubby’s body just did NOT handle the vasectomy well at all. I’m going to call his office this week and see if he has any ideas for us. We haven’t seen him since 2016 and he basically told us it might just take time. Time.
if you have ANY insight, advice, ideas, ANYTHING, I would really appreciate hearing it. If this is going to be how our life is, than ok. We are Christians, we believe in the sovereignty of Jesus and we know that in the big picture, we’ll be ok. However, if I’m missing something that might work, that might help, I want to pursue it! It’s so overwhelming and there’s so much info out there! I just don’t want to miss anything.
Thanks. You all are so amazing. Thank you for sharing your stories and sharing this crappy experience of PVPS. It’s the cruelest joke in the world, and we’re all stuck with it. <3