Memory Gaps?: So, 2 years since... - Advanced Prostate...

Advanced Prostate Cancer

21,000 members26,173 posts

Memory Gaps?

DarkEnergy profile image
86 Replies

So, 2 years since diagnosed PSA 1000+ with extensive metastasis, with a few jumbo tumors that caused havoc. Then, ADT, Lupron and Zytiga, a year later, 6 infusions of Taxotere. Now at PSA < 0.02.

I'm 60 years old and still employed as a software developer, love the work. But, darn, I've missed meetings set in my Outlook calendar and forget things at times. The memory gaps are not that much, but compared to 30 year old whipper snappers, My memory gaps could be highly noticeable.

My employer, knows about my PCa diagnosis and current "remission" status, but ADT, not PCa will most likely end my career.

I know my online buddy tom67inMA is in my situation and similarly around the Boston area.

Anyway, like to hear from others that gets this intermittent memory gap episodes.

Written by
DarkEnergy profile image
DarkEnergy
To view profiles and participate in discussions please or .
Read more about...
86 Replies
SPEEDYX profile image
SPEEDYX

I remember the first and last part of your post...middle is a distant memory!!!!...Focus on the light with those memory gaps...Fight on brother!!

in reply to SPEEDYX

Wait -a-minute?? 🤔What are we talkin about again?..

SPEEDYX profile image
SPEEDYX in reply to

😂Minute ...it was 3 hours ago!!

in reply to SPEEDYX

Same thing to me .time is running on us all

SPEEDYX profile image
SPEEDYX in reply to

Yes...but let us all take the senic route!!!

CaseydelaTor profile image
CaseydelaTor in reply to SPEEDYX

😛🤣🤔🤭

DarkEnergy profile image
DarkEnergy in reply to SPEEDYX

I don't remember mentioning lights, was it the Jumbo Tumors that look like fireflies? Fireflies only live two years, hopefully my PCa will out live this... :0

SPEEDYX profile image
SPEEDYX in reply to DarkEnergy

I will specifically pray that you outlive those fireflies for many more years!!!

DarkEnergy profile image
DarkEnergy in reply to SPEEDYX

All the best, I wish you all success in this war, my warrior compadre...

SPEEDYX profile image
SPEEDYX in reply to DarkEnergy

Yes...fighting together!!!

DarkEnergy profile image
DarkEnergy in reply to SPEEDYX

I don't know why, but when reading your posts, have an image of a person typing on a computer wearing Speedo's...

SPEEDYX profile image
SPEEDYX in reply to DarkEnergy

😂.....never wore speedos... body was built for speed...wore anything from ripped shorts to Lee Jeans....slim student cut!!!

GP24 profile image
GP24

I think this happens when you get older. Also, when you had these gaps twenty years ago, you did not worry.

On the other hand, your young collegues cannot code in assembler and cobol, so your employer needs you.

DarkEnergy profile image
DarkEnergy in reply to GP24

Assembler and Cobol, dude, I'm a young 60 year old, JavaScript, Java and Python are my lingua franca.

Kaliber profile image
Kaliber in reply to DarkEnergy

What ?????? No CPM, Mumps and Turtle ..... ooohhhhhhhh nooooooooooo. Now I really feel old.

😂😂😂😂😂😂

DarkEnergy profile image
DarkEnergy in reply to Kaliber

Yeah, I'm an Hey, healthcare software guru, means good bucks, Mumps is 20 years before it's time.

Kaliber profile image
Kaliber in reply to DarkEnergy

I’m a retired supervisory biomedical engineer. Spent 22 years in the V.A. System and 8 years with the Army hospital system. I specialized in nmr, nuclear med and radiology and management. Was able to retire when I was 49 , about 25 years ago. My younger wife works for U.C.S.F. S.F.. as a physician’s liaison. she retires in about a week and a half. PCa and Covid lockdown has trashed all her / our plans. I was smok’in back when CPM came in and then writing and compiling dos executables in C and C+ / turtle and decompiling. Long before GUI’s. I loved the stuff and wrote code for several executables for the 3D vector cardio graph research project. In the early days I installed and maintained all the Vax and mini Vax hardware for the V.A. fresno and UCSF Fresno. I installed the first gigantic ( physically ) 20 mb rack mounted hard drive for the UCSF lab. All tape before that. Back then mounting that hardware required some mini wire cutters and snipping super tiny wire wraps on a huge hardware buss fixture. It was tedious and scary. A slip of the snipers could be a quarter of a million dollar mistake back then.

Times sure have changed, i guess you are too young to quit to conserve your QOL time or prefer to spend your remaining time dedicated to your work. A job you obviously love. I’m 2 years in now too... psa and T undetectable ( like you psa 1400 - 1600 at first ). I’m thinking I’ll probably get that coveted third year and since I’m a “ adt super responder “ ( sounds like you are too ) .. that chances of the full remaining 36 months ( or a goodly portion of it ) are good as well. Probably like everyone here , I’m hoping to beat the odds yayahahahaya there are plenty of guys here that have. Most don’t do that , tho. Seems like brothers have been dropping like flies lately. Yuck ....

SPEEDYX profile image
SPEEDYX in reply to Kaliber

I didn't know you sold and install vacuums and even mini ones too and most likely central Vacs!!!

Kaliber profile image
Kaliber in reply to SPEEDYX

Yayahahahaya.... well I was married and had a baby on the way when I was 18. I worked at a Steak and Shake as a curb waiter ... my little cummerbund and black bow tie. I’ve busted suds in Ranch House Restaurant and even worse jobs to support my family ... selling vacuums probably would have sounded pretty good back then yayahahahaya.

DarkEnergy profile image
DarkEnergy in reply to Kaliber

I still remember when squeezing extra available extended memory stack from DOS.

So, the "memory" is not all the bad...😏

Kaliber profile image
Kaliber in reply to DarkEnergy

Our first Serious medical computer was a cart mounted roll around mini Vax with two 7” floppy drives. It ran CPM . It was the first computer game I ever played too .. “ you are in a East west passage , you hear a rustling off in the distance “ ( no name at the time, later called aardvark or zork or something like that ) yayahahahaya all line entry computing , no GUI’s back then. we used the computer to “:average “ the light output of the 128 photo multiplier tubes in the nuclear gamma camera head. It was a godsend. The first time we could identify dead or low performing pmt tubes easily and “ smooth “ the image for radically improved resolution. Before that , doing that work was extremely tedious and time consuming. Computers were like a miracle. Computers exploded about then and it was off to the races to what we have now .. looking back , ... a mind boggling transition we never could have foreseen then. Seems laughably simplistic stuff now, but was world changing in its era. I shudder to think what will be in another 30 years. Wow ...

SPEEDYX profile image
SPEEDYX in reply to Kaliber

We will be waiting for your analysis!!!

Kaliber profile image
Kaliber in reply to SPEEDYX

Analysis: gumption disfunction

SPEEDYX profile image
SPEEDYX in reply to Kaliber

So True...We dont even have to wait that long to know what will be!!

DarkEnergy profile image
DarkEnergy in reply to Kaliber

Yep, Route 128, before COVID-19, used this passage weekly....

Kaliber profile image
Kaliber in reply to DarkEnergy

I had a son-in-law that was well known , that programmed in http, python and advanced java script ... he created and ran numerous local sites and was the local programmer , site manager, for the Arc. He coded a lot for paraplegics with eye motion control programming. Anakin his web name. He is now in federal prison for his dark web exploits. Thought he could outsmart the FBI. I won’t say why or his real name.

I was on in the beginning, first Arpanet then telenet then IRC. ..thru UCSF and 14k dialups. I had a very early www site called Moxina Mind Spring and caused a stir one Christmas giving away my famous Coca-Cola free gift. I had 100,000 hits a month, unheard of in those days. The gift was a free drink holder for a can of coke ... when you ran the executable , it opened the tray on your CD drive. Yayahahahaya. MMS gave away transmitter ID fingerprinting executables and the first FFT waterfall eavesdropping software ever available on the web among the many other executables it made available. I have had web sites that sold microscopic animals for micro aquariums... the feds put me out of business, said I had to dye the organisms I was growing to prove domestic production ...otherwise they were endangered species and I had to stop. I stopped, fluro dye killed my little buddies. I had web sites for home hobby reloading of 79mm LAW rocket launchers and a couple 37mm self propelled grenade launcher hobby sites, one voted “ best of the web “ three month in a row. All taken down after 9/11. All still popular stuff now tho. I terrorized the IRC flame wars with 100s of alter egos, 100s of web crawling spiders and flame bots. I used to be the original Krackula, HaXoR , a_alpha1 and several others web monickers. Hacked original Motorola bag and brick phones way back before the federal EE3 laws against it and even enjoyed a a_alpha1 tribute site for brick hacking on the IHUG Isp provider in N.Z among others. That ihug tribute site was up for decades. Those are just the high points I can talk about, been out of the business for decades now. It was a richly exciting time back in those days.

treedown profile image
treedown

At this point I can't be sure what is adt related and what is age related anymore. Work is slower than normal for me which is good because the stress level is through the roof when I am busy which I would rather avoid now. I can't say I have noticed anything I would call a memory gap yet, but I am only a year into this an ed I continually modify my software and sytems to take up my slack. Luckily I can do that.

DarkEnergy profile image
DarkEnergy in reply to treedown

I work for a very large corporation, but I do code without having weeks of meetings and heaps of incoherent specs, so in a cool sweet spot.

treedown profile image
treedown in reply to DarkEnergy

Hope it lasts as long as you want it to.

DarkEnergy profile image
DarkEnergy in reply to treedown

Yes, you know very well, I'm blessed. What about you, do you code without endless meetings?

treedown profile image
treedown in reply to DarkEnergy

No coding. I own my own business and created my own software in a relational database.

DarkEnergy profile image
DarkEnergy in reply to treedown

Awesome, my brain will like a business to run. DOH!, I have a successful business, my wife runs it, because I'm too busy working - wait a minute, let me reflect...

treedown profile image
treedown in reply to DarkEnergy

Me and my wife are a team in our business. Works well for the most part.

tom67inMA profile image
tom67inMA

I was in your situation a year ago, you don't want to be in my current situation (neuroendocrine that has come back after platinum chemo) :-)

Anyway, I definitely had chemo brain, but generally was surprised at how well my brain was working last fall. I recently went on a hike with a guy from my scrum team that is now fighting small cell lung cancer. We went on leave a week apart, and had the same treatment. I had the better initial response, but his response is proving more durable with stable disease. But anyway...

He told me, and nobody said this to me before, that when I first returned to work last summer I seemed a little slower for the first couple months, but then seemed to be my old self afterwards. I turn 53 next month, so have a slight age advantage.

If this was a rambling reply, I blame cabazitaxel and medical weed.

- Tom (lightly stoned)

DarkEnergy profile image
DarkEnergy in reply to tom67inMA

Oh boy, neuroendocrine is amongst one of the humongous crap you're going through. You are a very kewl dude, hope we can meet up soon one day...

tom67inMA profile image
tom67inMA in reply to DarkEnergy

When can definitely arrange that, possibly in two weeks when my immune system has recovered from Monday's chemo. I'll send you some contact info in a PM.

j-o-h-n profile image
j-o-h-n in reply to tom67inMA

a guy from my scrum team that is now fighting small cell lung cancer.

Will Keytruda work for him? Lungs....

Good Luck, Good Health and Good Humor.

j-o-h-n Wednesday 10/21/2020 5:59 PM DST

tom67inMA profile image
tom67inMA in reply to j-o-h-n

He was on atezolizumab (similar to Keytruda) but had to stop because of side effects. It killed his thyroid gland.

j-o-h-n profile image
j-o-h-n in reply to tom67inMA

Ahhh too bad....

Good Luck, Good Health and Good Humor.

j-o-h-n Wednesday 10/21/2020 7:35 PM DST

Hey guy! 2 yrs? Time flys when you’re having fun eh? I’ll be 60 in May .. I’ve been on adt over five years now .. it grinds you down in time . .. we all feel the many declines.. good job ! keep workin if you can .? Being broke with little income sucks . Having income is good for self worth .. great Psa<0.02 now the goal is to stay there for many years . All the time we know that pc tends to come back for its dinner ..all the more reason to live for today ..no promises made ... keep rocking baby! 😎💪

DarkEnergy profile image
DarkEnergy in reply to

Yeah, 2 years man, you are my boy, now that I know I'm the elder...

in reply to DarkEnergy

Pretty close . I’m from planet 61

GoBucks profile image
GoBucks

Almost at the 3 year mark for ADT. Oh my Joe Buck's hair looks terrible. Guess I haven't seen him in awhile. Where were we? Yes, getting older makes us have "senior moments". But ADT is for sure causing me to have more than just senior moments. I started keeping a diary of crazy crap I was doing but sort of gave that up. Maybe I forgot to do it? I don't remember. My MO suggested I sign up for Brain HQ. Pretty cool site and I think it can help. At my last appt. Doc asks "How's the Brain HQ going?" I said I keep forgetting to do it. Sigh...

in reply to GoBucks

When I got dxed in 2015 there was a guy with pc o 60 minutes.. He was a professor in England. . He did a study of how men on adt with no t get lost easily along with losing many other male traits it appears sense of direction is one of them . I’ve found this to be very true..

Gearhead profile image
Gearhead in reply to

My understanding always was that the reason men have a better sense of direction than women has to do with the different way that they pee.

DarkEnergy profile image
DarkEnergy in reply to Gearhead

I think you're on to something...

in reply to Gearhead

You know more that I. He sad that women navigate more from landmarks . A normal guy might have great sense ,a guy with no t might not ..

rocketphd profile image
rocketphd

Memory Issues with ADT

Wassersug profile image
Wassersug

The medical literature has documented cognitive impacts from ADT. There have been several academic reviews published in the last couple of years on the topic. They are reviewed in the blog postings at LIFEonADT.com

Gearhead profile image
Gearhead

When I took computer programming (FORTRAN) in college, it was a no-credit course because it was regarded as having so little intellectual content -- sort of like slide rule manipulation.

DarkEnergy profile image
DarkEnergy in reply to Gearhead

Well, FORTRAN is bit mathematically biased software language, so....

BruceSF profile image
BruceSF

I had a lot of memory issues when I was on adt and Zytiga. I went to a PCRI conference early on and fortunately a speaker there addressed the problem of ‘Lupron fog.’ He said that a good supplement for that was something called ‘American ginseng with Wisconsin roots.’ So I typed it into Amazon on my phone before I could forget it, and ordered a box. It has worked pretty well at helping me to greatly reduce my embarrassing senior moments.

There’s something special about the strain that grows in Wisconsin (it’s called Panax, it grows in Korea also). I work near San Francisco’s Chinatown, and many stores there have shelves full of this stuff - apparently its properties are well established in that community.

The most popular brand is called’Prince of Peace,’ it appears to be a large Asian owned farm in Wisconsin. They have capsules if you don’t like teas.

DarkEnergy profile image
DarkEnergy in reply to BruceSF

Appreciate the info because I don't like tea.

Although, I'm not so keen about supplements, but trying Sulbutiamine, so far can't tell if I'm smarter. Perhaps taking it with Bourbon may have some counter-effects, will try it with beer and see what happens...

2dee profile image
2dee

Memory.

After reading all the replies I struggle to remember whether I had planned to reply or not.

Here's what I know for sure about MY journey. I'm 78, done lots of businesses including building relational database business automation apps. I've always felt that a person needs a nearly flawless memory and ability to multitask in order to code at any level. I was already losing some ability due to age I guess. I had been doing less automaton projects and focusing more on training development and presentations. But in 2018 when I started ADT I noticed a rapid lose of ability. Now I really struggle holding a single thought or goal for any period of time.

But, hey, I'm over 2yrs past my "use by" date and making do pretty well. Maybe memory isn't all it's cracked up to be. Maybe survival is a good side effect even at the expense of my wonderful multitasking mind.

2Dee

dmt1121 profile image
dmt1121

As the saying may go, according to my failing memory: tell them young turks..." I've forgotten more in my lifetime than you'll ever know!" From John Wayne and/or Clint Eastwood movie. We have all had these episodes and they can be brought on by extreme stress, addditional meds for sleep or other ailments, etc.

The young ones know technology and programming, but if it's like my business, they can completely miss the point about users, real world usabilty and not to use buyers as beta testers!

That shot was for AUTOdesk.

Fightinghard profile image
Fightinghard

Find the silver lining- i no longer stress about mistakes that I made years ago, now I can not even remember mistakes from 2 hours ago. Peace

in reply to Fightinghard

😂😂🥳

Patrick-Turner profile image
Patrick-Turner

Unless you were Superman, your memory is never going to be as good at 60 as it is at 30.

As life goes by, your memory cells fill up and your brain gets so darn full of stuff that it forces out the roots of your hair and you go bald.

I have had ADT since 2010, and apart from not being able to instantly remember a few names of ppl and daily use things, its surprising that most ppl say I have a very good memory and when I am asked a question about a page at my website of 65MB at turneraudio.com.au I usually know the answer without having to read the website page I wrote during last 21 years with 4 major updates.

I also have kept a diary since age 14 and I regret not spending more time writing more, but when ppl sometimes contact me about something they say happened in 1979, I can confirm what I recall by reading what I wrote. That was handy when an old GF emailed and seemed to suggest much more happened between us than actually did happen. Memories get distorted by time, And no, I didn't want to see her again, and if she did, it would be cheating on her husband. I had reasons why I didn't like her, besides the sex being hopelessly bad, and me being extremely reluctant at the time to form any relationship with anyone so soon after a hopelessly bad wife has vamoosed on an 11pm flight out of town in 1978.

I sure don't enjoy returning to a painful part of my past which is best forgotten. But she sent me a picture a friend had taken of me, which indicates that the "The olda I get, tha betta I woz" There is a whole pile of stuff about how we conducted our lives between 18 and 35, being lead around by our dicks, that needs to be deleted, and replaced with the terrible time of youth with true civilized behavior which is not boring to us at 60, 70, 80 or 90+

Aging is a time for wisdom, but that depends on how healthy our brains are, and by 60, many men have become 3/4 stupid and are forgetting far more than they learn, so they will never become respected elders of our tribe.

Of course memory depends also on the amount of alcohol has been drunk or joints smoked etc, so if there are no dementia genes in a man, he needs to have stayed off the booze etc, because it damages memory and how to think clearly and quickly.

It been shown time and time again that when young folks just can't find out why something dos not work, its time to bring in someone with grey hair to work out what went wrong.

So unless you find you spend 5% of your time trying to remember words in any conversation, where ppl begin to conclude you are losing your marbles, then

Don't Wurrie, Be Happee, ok.

I find cycling 200km a week keeps my mind in good shape, despite having almost zero testosterone since 2010.

I do take time to work out why I said or wrote some things during last 20 years, and memories of ppl especially of women come back to haunt me at 4am, so I turn on TV and its usually so boring it puts me to sleep again, after a dream that seemed real, but wasn't, when what really happened is remembered in 2 minutes. Long term memories can stay a long time, and it was amazing how much my mother remembered about a fiance she had before she married my dad in 1944. A Japanese tank blew off the fiance's head in New Guinea but she clung to all his letters and cherished them at 97. She recalled being at school in 1925,

and having been punished for asking a nun "If God made the world, who made God?"

That question has not been satisfactorily answered, IMHO.

Oh, and what is Dark Matter, or is there Dark Energy?

The 30 yo ppl have trouble answering such questions.

Patrick Turner.

DarkEnergy profile image
DarkEnergy in reply to Patrick-Turner

Patrick-Turner

You are amazing, so fortunate of having a response from you regarding my post. Yes, us older guys lost some things, but gain some things too. As you explained, life for all of us is a sliding level, what we had from youth, we gain much as the years move on. Meaning, our bodies look older, but our mind is flourished with wisdom, a youth that is not understood.

Patrick-Turner profile image
Patrick-Turner in reply to DarkEnergy

Indeed, right through youth we fight for sex, money, and laterr aggrandizement thus someone like Donald Tramp or Joe Beedon ends up maybe having had enough sex, got enough money, and wants to be the King Of America.

well not all blokes who get over 50 with $$$ and a worn out Rodger is fit to govern a country, but they can't help themselves and they even let us ordinary ppl decide if they would do a good job with a grand social position; ie chief of the National Tribe.

I have never had any ambition to rule others apart from a short time when I was boss of a motorcycle club, which didn't last long, and then I became a building site foreman that lasted longer, and I needed a good memory for such positions so I know I didn't get as drunk as often as my peer group, or make as many silly mistakes with life matters such as choice of woman to marry, and what to do if it was not working out.

Anyway, IMHO, it is an excellent life practice to ask ourselves what was it that we did well when 30, and could we do more like that without the stress and competition with other men. Hence I drifted to a bicycle for best easy way to get healthy and stay healthy, but physical health requires a healthy body without arthritis and excessive weight.

Then I found I didn't want to keep doing building construction work after about 50, because knees just didn't have the right genes I saw in other men who were able to handle building work unto 75 or older. When I ran my own building business for 22 years, I employed may old guys. The oldest team were two bricklayers, one 63, other 74, and they has an ex brick layer for a laborer who was 86. These blokes could do real hard work all day and had no bad aches or pains. Before 50 I had no idea that I'd be forced out of the building trade where I did all the carpentry and supervision on jobs, but my knees just got so sore I had to hang up the hammer. So I did, and had to settle for being a different man. For many years I could not walk very well. So getting married again just was not possible because women expect a fully healthy man.

That was as bad as having ADT. But then a doctor rescued me when I was 58 in 2005 and he gave me a double knee arthroscopy, and I was no longer in pain so my confidence went up, and I looked for a GF again. I could walk enough with her. But I only one lady 57 who had her menopause begin at 35, and she had so many mental problems that I could not maintain desire for her, Younger women were never interested in me and it a complete myth that any woman under 40 willing to partner with "some old dude" over 55, unless he has a perfect body and mind, and has a fortune to share with her.

So an ordinary man does not have to have much missing from what makes up a perfect man to not be able to get laid over 55. Years went by quickly. Online dating was a complete disaster, with everyone telling lies about themselves to score a partner, and I was never into anything casual.

And by 58, I'd become a repairer and maker of custom audio gear where earnings were 1/10 of building contractors wages, so I wasn't a pot of gold for the ladies, and of course so many ladies were online, wanting a man, but but none could really function like they did under 35.

But the bike also rescued me at 59, and I found I could cycle as knees seemed ok, and I soon found I could go fast, and weight got right again, so it was like a another time of youth was given to me for free. All that stuff about mating and being sexually attractive didn't matter at all.

Then I got Pca at 62, and it definitely was an "Oh shit" moment, because I knew I could be dead soon real easy Now what woman would ever accept me? A poxed up old guy? Nah, it wasn't ever goner happen. The RP was a flop because there was too much Pca out and around the PG capsule. Another "Ah shit" moment. Then ADT, another "Ah shit " moment.

But I could still cycle and work in my interesting electronics craft work. ADT lasted from 2010 to 2016 before it failed, then Cosadex was added, got 6 months more, and while Psa was low I got both knee joints replaced. Free with Medicare, and maybe make the next few years left a bit more comfy. Then Cosadex failed, so Zytiga, bit it only lasted 8 months, then chemo, and it didn't work, so at end of 2018, I began Lu177, and 2 years later Psa > 10, and I am able to still cycle 200km+ a week at age 73. This youthful thing remains with me, it has not gone, sunken in the depth of our past.

I could be dead in a year or more, and surely do have some memory problems. My weakest link in brain function even when young was remembering names, so even though I watched the French Open Tennis on a clay surface I know Nidal won, but can't recall his first name or who he beat so easily. The tennis was really fabulous. So what if part of my memory is stuffed, and always was weak. It just don't matter that I am an imperfect man. Ah, now I recall the No two man, Jokovitch, gee, takes minutes before memory works about as well as a 1947 computer.

What most of us old dudes need of course is an IC memory chip installed into our heads and coupled to brain circuits, and about 1GB would be plenty, and then the young smart 30 yo guys would wonder why were suddenly far less forgetful than they are.

There is a team doing research at oldunimprovement.com.net

But most of use will be dead before that technology matures to become as possible and easy as getting a tooth filled.

We can't be around for a time when a cure for Pca is found.

But we can learn to live with Pca, like many other things.

Patrick Turner

timotur profile image
timotur in reply to Patrick-Turner

PT: your website is amazing. I diddled with electronics in amateur radio and know a little circuit design enough to know what you've accomplished and written about in your career is astounding. Well done Sir...!

Patrick-Turner profile image
Patrick-Turner in reply to timotur

Well I humbly agree with the Well done Sir bit, but despite being so creative with old fashioned analog audio electronics, my net earnings over 18 years was about equal to the dole at about usd $200 per week, or about 1/4 of average weekly earnings.

I didn't mind the necessary frugality. I fully understood what the word "NO" meant.

So economically I was a dismal failure, but I had bad knees so bad there was little else I could do that would have earned me more and allowed me to have freedom from working for a nasty boss, and freedom to work at home, and I owned my house so I didn't have to pay rent, and had a boarder to help pay bills, so I survived quite well.

I am making a couple of tube power amps at the moment.

I need to get some more tradies in to do some work I have no time for.

I have no idea how long I will last, but maybe there is time for two last amps. Maybe they are never sold and end up going to the rubbish tip, But I won't be around to care about any of my assets when I am dead. I like making stuff, my arthritis in hands is not excessive, so why would I not do a bit more, and publish all results.

I'm soldering onward.........

Patrick Turner.

timotur profile image
timotur in reply to Patrick-Turner

Well, regardless of the economics, you did an excellent job with your trade, there's enough fine detail there to publish a nice book on audio amps if you ever desired. I had an old Dynaco tube amp back in the day and really wish I still had it. I also worked with some tube-based radio gear-- mostly Heathkit, back in the late 60's, early 70's (6CL6 pre-amp, and 6146 rf final). I loved the red glow of those things. The digital era pretty much rendered tubes obsolete, but tube audio amps made a comeback with some of the Class A purists I think.

Patrick-Turner profile image
Patrick-Turner in reply to timotur

I never had time to write a book and publish it. In this day and age, it seemed a lot better to just put the schematic of all I made online with full explanations of how it worked, so that info is easily accessed for free to anyone, for service work in future when I ain't here. Anyone wanting a book can download the whole website and print it. Quite a few have done that, and they get 3 volumes of A4 pages each about 2" thick, and 1,500pages, but there is no need.

There is also no book type of index so using the book is more difficult than use of website. I have not added a search function that you can't have in a book. Anyone is free to add their own search app. Why should I provide all things for all ppl?

I just registered my website for 5 more years. By then most ppl who like to build tube gear will be dead. I tell ppl to down load it to a CD or several, so if they lose one they have another. Its free, yet they want a book.

I have found that although I gave everyone the best way to get good music with tubes, many still like to do it their own way. I don't care if anyone copies my designs because I am not famous, so there's no $$ to be had by selling a copy of a famous brand. The Chinese will never copy anything at my website because they can't understand it and afaik, nobody has translated it into Chinese language. If it it was about rocket science then sure, the brightest young Chinese minds would have been told to decode the English and exploit the info.

Nearly all tube amp makers in past employed accountants to design amps sold to public, especially for your Dynaco which was what I call a Bean Counter Special. They ignored the engineering I recommend.

The Patrick's Concerns page about my experience of Pca is a book in itself, and slowly gets bigger as time goes by as I update it.

Patrick Turner.

Zetabow profile image
Zetabow

I was a developer in a Bank but quit that 12 years ago. I was bit of a mess in Nov 2018 diagnosed with terrible pain, one day in the Hospital (summer of 2019) with pain specialist she brought Hospital lawyer in and said we've decided your're too ill to work and will retire you, they set all the meetings up with Social services (I'm resident in Estonia), they first contacted UK Social services but they were not interested as I was diagnosed and live in Estonia, to my amazement Estonian Social services decided to pay me disability so I don't need to work. I then contacted my bank to get my pension early which is quite generous. Oncologist said I wont make my 60th birthday.

I do own my own company my Wife has taken over the running and I just help out with easy tasks when I feel up to it. It's also good to have this free time as I have two boys 11 and 10 years, I can spend more time with them.

Fight11 profile image
Fight11

Are you castrate resistant?

DarkEnergy profile image
DarkEnergy in reply to Fight11

No, I'm responding well to ADT, my PSA <0.02...

MarkBC profile image
MarkBC

I certainly have more difficulty remembering and concentrating on tasks since I started ADT about 2.5 years ago. It is part of the reason I retired early with a disability pension at age 55.

larry_dammit profile image
larry_dammit

I call that chemo brain. I know the word but had to draw a picture in my mind to make it come out. 4 years post chemo. Lot better now but was rough for a while. Keep up the fight warrior 🙏🙏🙏

ctflatlander profile image
ctflatlander

I would die for undectable so forget about memory loss. I'm 76 in the same boat but have my wife to fill in the words.

in reply to ctflatlander

Good to have back up.

Teltech profile image
Teltech

Yep, I refer to my mind as Swiss Cheese. PSA was 96 at diagnosis a year an 1/2 ago. Feeling lumps in my back, Mets everywhere else. PSA in December was .02 now Oct 21: is at 6.7. I’m wigging out looking for Doc to adj my meds

in reply to Teltech

Whoa nelly!😫

RonnyBaby profile image
RonnyBaby

I recall the brain fog / memory gaps during ADT - I can only state that I spent some effort in 'forcing myself' to think before I acted - it was a conscious effort and it took some practice to continue doing it.

Pressure situations are less than ideal, when it comes to 'memory management'. I spent a great deal of my career as a software developer and can think of little to offer to help assist your particular 'problem'.

Hopefully, you can have an honest discussion about your 'problem(s)' and hopefully, there can be some type of consideration - but - barring that - there is something that I developed over a period of time that could help - I created my own 'library' files - parts of reusable code

that seemed to be used in many / most applications.

Those portions of code could then be modified to suit the specific application that I was writing. More often than not, I might have to change 'variable names' or actual data fields with the appropriate name or field in the new 'APP'.

IF you think about my suggestion, you might discover some shortcuts to make things easier for you. There is another possibility - assuming you have access - you can use 'other' bits of code (written by others) to help build or add to your library.

The above suggestion might be asking too much - because you might need to do this outside of working hours - but I recall doing this for myself and it was a huge advantage for me. I could 'use' debugged code' ( I knew it worked) and I could remain productive - the library files allowed me to focus on the 'custom code' or specific requirements for that UNIQUE portion of the new 'App'.

Good luck with the 'gaps' - hopefully, someone else has a better suggestion ....

dadzone43 profile image
dadzone43

Some like to laugh these things off. I do not. Happily, I do not experience them. Unhappily I hear a lot about MOs dismissing these symptoms or claiming that they do not occur. We have an obligation to make them aware.

DarkEnergy profile image
DarkEnergy in reply to dadzone43

Absolutely agree, the docs do go through an extensive education process before given the "Dr" edict.

But, in this education journey, they do not get "human' communications training, us patients are the "commoners", they see us as slots in their schedule. HealthUlocked does not help, it's really just a sound board that goes on without any beneficial results to us cancer patients.

dadzone43 profile image
dadzone43 in reply to DarkEnergy

I see a benefit in a sound board. It certainly has helped some of the men in my support group and has helped keep me informed as both a patient and the "leader" of that group.

DarkEnergy profile image
DarkEnergy in reply to dadzone43

I want to have a private/public Advanced Prostate Cancer web site that offers much more than clinical trails stuff, real patients in living the life...

MateoBeach profile image
MateoBeach

Looks like your question sparked trips down memory lane here. I had brain fog that especially impaired verbal learning for me (studying Sanskrit had to be abandoned). That and general fogginess. For me it was first docetaxel and was mild, clearing over about two years. ( was not on ADT then ). Later when I started ADT was much worse cognitive decrease I described. I found that when I added estradiol patches to ADT with dutasteride it was much better. I think extra estradiol markedly improved overall well being on ADT including cognitive effects. Learning speed and recall much more fluid and seem normal now. Though my Sanskrit still sucks! 😆🤷‍♂️

Your employer must make every effort for reasonable accommodation for your condition. You should be able to extend your career if you can find some adjustments and are given flexibility. Best of luck and happy your treatments are doing you good. Request a trial of estradiol patches and discuss with your MO.

j-o-h-n profile image
j-o-h-n

Bring back 80 column punch cards.......

Good Luck, Good Health and Good Humor.

j-o-h-n Wednesday10/21/2020 5:55 PM DST

Gearhead profile image
Gearhead in reply to j-o-h-n

In 1969, I wrote a user's manual for a computer program (way before they were called applications) with the input instructions in terms of what to punch in Card 1, Column 1, 2, 3..., Card 2, Column 1, 2, 3..., etc. Pardon me if I boast, but that program is still used today. Users understand that Card 5, Column 8 simply means Line 5, Column 8 of the .in text file.

j-o-h-n profile image
j-o-h-n in reply to Gearhead

Good Job... now tell me what is a sorting needle?.....

Good Luck, Good Health and Good Humor.

j-o-h-n Wednesday 10/21/2020 9:50 PM DST

Gearhead profile image
Gearhead in reply to j-o-h-n

I confess I had to look it up. Don't recall ever needing one for punching cards, or for feeding a box full of FORTRAN cards to computer to be compiled, or for feeding the much smaller batch of compiled machine-language cards to the computer to run the program.

j-o-h-n profile image
j-o-h-n in reply to Gearhead

What about SPS or SPS1?

By the time I'm finished with you.... you'll be a punch card trivia freak...👀

Good Luck, Good Health and Good Humor.

j-o-h-n Thursday 10/22/2020 11:28 AM DST

timotur profile image
timotur

My favorite ADT memory lapse is putting something in the microwave and finding it the next morning. After 18 months on ADT I've lost some of what I call short-term "spatial awareness" of things around me. Another one is, looking for my backpack, and it's on my shoulder. Really weird.

Jimhoy profile image
Jimhoy

DE

I wish I could offer words of inspiration but........ memory loss to cognitive decline to executive decline equaled the end of career!!! Off ADT for now but those are the only side effects still unrelenting!! Too long of a story anymore!!!

Jc

You may also like...

Xtandi gap

story short, I'm on ADT & Xtandi and just retired this past summer. While employed I was fortunate...

Memory loss on steroids

Hi, A quick summary, 83 years old, prostate cancer 16 years, also have A-fib and macular...

Memorial Sloan Kettering, NYC

Surgery, Radiation, and 12-18 mos of ADT. Said best to catch Advanced PCa when cells are asleep and...

Memory loss with Lupron and Xtandi

I have been on Lupron for 3 years after diagnosis of mPC with lesions on L2, S2, and H6 in May of...

Erleda and Memory Issues

since my dad has started Erleda 4 months ago, his memory almost immdiatly started declining. He is...