HP’s experience: Open or closed-ended?

Thanks to those in the newsgroup that responded to my previous post regarding open or closed-ended. I’m happy to report that I got my open-ended procedure done today. Here’s my story.

As mentioned earlier, I have 4 lovely kids. Saw my wife went through a 2 C-section and told myself to never again let her go through that. Also at my age (40), I no longer want to put up with raising a baby. My youngest is 6 months and I’m still suffering from all late-night feedings, etc. My wife didn’t want a tubal and refuse to go on the pill, so that didn’t leave me much choice. I use a condom, but always get nervous about condom’s reliability and slippage accident. I thought about waiting for the male pill, but with anything new, there is also risk associated with it. So I decided on a vasectomy.

I have mixed opinions about this WEB site. Four people I know personally told me vasectomy is no big deal and they are happy with it. Most medical internet sites about vasectomy also said it’s safe and simple.

This newsgroup site has so many PVP stories and that made me really nervous. It also has a lot of positive stories that were helpful. I also learn about open-ended from this site. To summarize, if I didn’t know about this site, I wouldn’t have learned about open-ended, but the PVP stories also make me more nervous than necessary.

The vasectomy

On my procedure today. The doctor numbed me and did the open-ended. He actually screwed up and cauterized both ends on the first vas, but I told my wife what to watch for she caught him, and so he just cut the burnt end on the testicular side. He said he is so used to doing closed-ended that it was a normal reaction. The second vas, he just cauterizes the prostatic end only. He then folds the sheath over and put a clip so that it divides the two end. Note that the clip is not over the vas, but over the sheath between the two ends of the vas. He did also remove a section of a vas, but it seems like 3mm or so, not the 1 cm that I expected.

The night before the procedure I was so nervous that I felt light-headed. I had to take some Klonopin to calm down and sleep. I also almost canceled the procedure the day before because of the fear of PVP or loss of libido after the procedure.

Afterthoughts

The procedure it self IS A PIECE OF CAKE. I wouldn’t wish to do it again, but it would be no sweat if I have to if I don’t get the all clear in a few months.

So reading all the PVP on this site gave me anxiety and panic attack for nothing. I say cleaning my teeth was a lot worse. However, I guess the site is great for giving both sides of the story. My recommendation to any men thinking about vasectomy, but are afraid of the pain is don’t be. It’s no worse than giving blood. And remember, no pain is greater than having an unwanted child.

My wife is a registered nurse. She is not squeamish at all when it comes to looking at surgery. I made sure to tell her about the procedure so that she could catch any mistake. The only thing that I’m still unsure about, now that the whole procedure seems almost painless, is whether I should have opted for closed-ended for the extra security. Oh well, I guess I will make sure to have a sperm test at least one year from now just to make sure. After a year, I think things would have settled into a permanent state.

Oh yeah, another good news about the fear of losing my libido. This morning while watching cable, I got wood after seeing a revealing female. Almost ask my wife to check out the equipment, but thought the better of it and decide to wait for at least 1 week. The fear of feeling depressed for not being able to produce any more kids is also non-existent. I’m just happy that this is done and over with. The fun part of asking my wife to help with the 20 ejaculations in the next 2 months will soon begin. I wonder if she will let me watch porn if she decides that 3 times a week is too much for her to handle. At least I won’t be too embarrassed if she caught me helping myself. I could say “Hey honey, this is for my medical procedure….” 🙂

Thanks to all who been contributing positive stories to this site. It really helped me in making my decision. It has been 8 hours since my operation. I have had no pain, but I’m following all the precautions just in case. I will update my progress if I run into a problem. Otherwise, I will stop posting unless someone has a question for me. Thank you and good luck to all of you.

Update November 2, 2004

I had my vasectomy done on Thursday. I stayed in bed all Thursday and Friday. On Saturday I walked around the house a bit. So far I had no pain or problem. On Sunday I drove my daughter to the bookstore and to the park, that night I had some mild achiness.

I returned to work on Monday. I have a desk job, but unfortunately, last week was quite busy. I had to walk about 20 feet back and forth to the lab about 10 times that day. When I got home, I noticed some bruising at the base of the penis and also mild swelling. I also had a little bit of pain in the testicle.

Tuesday was pretty much the same. Not much pain in the morning and by the evening, things got quite uncomfortable. I got back on the Advil, the ice, and stuffed socks in my tight underwear for support. This pattern repeated until Friday. Most of the time, it was a mild ache and uneasiness. Once in a while, I had a sharp pain that lasted for a second in the testicle. The achiness occurred on one side, then disappeared and returned on the other side. It could switch back and forth on the same day.

I was getting a little worried. Saturday, I took it easy, but the pain didn’t subside. On Sunday I bought a BIKE supporter and I feel better after wearing it. It’s now late Monday. I think the pain is not as bad as last week. Overall, I would rate the pain as a 3 on a scale of 10. The sharp pain would be about a 9 or 10, but that only lasted a second or less and I think it happened less than 4 times.

Based on what I read on this site and on other literatures. I think I’m having a normal recovery. I hope that by the end of the 2nd week, I won’t have to walk like John Wayne anymore.

Oh yeah, almost forget to mention that on the 8th day after the vasectomy, my wife tested the family’s jewels and everything is OK. I haven’t felt comfortable enough to test it again, but it’s nice to know that it still works.

November 13th, 2004

It’s been 1-month post-op. I thought I update the group on my condition.

I still have some soreness on the left side in the evening if I’m a little active during the day. By active, I don’t mean playing sports, but more like carrying my toddler around or walking more than 150 yards. I also have some lower abdominal pain. However, most of my pains are manageable and only occur in the evening. The pain also getting less severe as the week passes by unless I’m really active or frisky in the morning. I guess you could say I have PVP, but I think I have no complication, just a very slow healing period. I don’t want this to be another PVP story that I dreaded when I was researching vasectomy. I’ve been back to the Doc and he said I’m fine, just takes a little longer to recover. I believe that had I just stay in bed for about 5 days after the surgery, I would have been ok. Unfortunately, I was up on the third day, walking around and lifting my toddler (just twice to get on and off the swing), and going back to work on the fourth day. Even I have a desk job, sitting does put pressure on the scrotum and standing doesn’t help much either.

I’m still wearing the support during the day. I’m a little behind on the 20 ejaculations for the 2 months sample. One time when I ejaculated, I felt some pain as if the titanium clip rubbed on a nerve or something. This happened only once so far. I guess I have to take it easy until I’m completely healed and hopefully the scarring tissue will cover the clips.

It’s interesting that most complaints about pain on this board are on the left side of the scrotum. I guess that’s the side that hangs lower than the other side for me and for most people who has a problem? Does anyone have a theory on why the side which supposed to be easier to work on has more problems than the other?

My cousin had a vasectomy done 2 weeks before I did, and he said that he felt fine as if nothing happened after the day of the surgery. He had the traditional method done. He only felt some pain if he touched the incision sites and that also went away after 1 week. I still have some pain if I squeeze my incision site (had NSV). I think if I had to do it all over again, I would choose the traditional method for the following reasons:

• 2 shots of local anesthetic into the scrotum instead of 3
• Control cut heals faster than un-control tear which could happen if the doctor stretches the hole too much. I think I may have a tear since my incision site still hurts a little.
• Less pulling and manipulation of the VAS that could lead to lower abdominal pain.

There’s not much else to report. When I’m completely healed or if I have other problems, I’ll update my story. Dave, feel free to update and revise my post for clarity. English is not my primary language so please excuse any writing error.

Update April 23, 2005

Here’s my final update on my post-op. I had PVP after a vasectomy 6 months ago. It wasn’t unbearable, but annoying enough that I had to raise my legs at night for relief. I took antibiotics but it didn’t help. I finally requested the doctor for an ultrasound. The ultrasound showed that I got Varicoceles, Hydroceles in my vas. Not sure if the Varicolese is a result of the vasectomy or not since I always felt that the vein I have is kinda large on one side of the scrotum. I kinda set my mind to deal with the problem for the rest of my life; Thinking that the mild pain that I had to deal with at night is less than having another child. Adding insult to the injury was that after 3 samples, I still didn’t get the all-clear.

Since I have a desk job, I cut out a cushion to sit on so that the pressure on my scrotum would be less and it did seem to help. Finally, after 4 months of this slight pain on the left side, it just went away w/o any treatment. I’m still sitting on the cushion just to be on the safe side. I also had to schedule an appointment with the doctor for a fourth sample that he checked within 2 hours for live sperm and he told me that he didn’t see any sperm. This was done at about 6 months post vasectomy.

Vasectomy is a personal decision that you have to make and be prepared to deal with any undesirable consequences. For me, it’s a worthwhile decision that I’m not regretting, and would recommend to my close friends with some cautions. Good luck to you all on your goal to be sterile.

Submitted by HP