More Some Side Effects of Prostate Radiation that Oncologists Kind of Tell you About; or, Hot Flashes Pt. III

Dante And Vigil Entering Hell by Gustave Doré

Picking up where I left off, I’d like to take each of those things I previously mentioned: 1) hot flashes; 2) low libido/ED/penile atrophy/ performance anxiety; 3) pissing in the moonlight; and 4) mood swings and depression. Think of them as them as a batting lineup with hot flashes leading off and depression batting cleanup. I mentioned that before, but these were nasty flashes. Came on an irregular basis with uncontrollable sweats and there was no remedy for them that didn’t have its own side effects, which I’ll talk about in another post. Flashes or flushes as the case may be, they often woke me up in the middle of the night, in the middle of a sweat. Even with AC or fans the flushes endured. Kind of like trying to kill vampire with a plastic knife. I figured I might have gotten some sympathy from my partner since, having gone through menopause herself, I thought she’d be really supportive, but she merely smiled and said, “Join the club. Buy a hand fan.” Rather than do that, I resorted to using Evian Facial spray, which may have looked foolish to an onlooker (especially another man…”so gay”), but when you feel like your brain has been toasting in an air fryer, who gives a shit about appearances. Better than using a fan from Puccini’s, Madame Butterfly, which would have made me an easy mark for a beating. For some of you who think these hot flashes only happen to wussies, this is a painting by Gustave Doré of Dante and Virgil entering hell because they couldn’t deal with their hot flashes. Remarkable.