diverticulum of the bladder with grade 3 cancer inside the diverticulum.

I am from Frisco, Texas and was searching for information on my bladder cancer and found your storyboard on the Web cafe Internet site. I too am having a hard time accepting my problem. I went to my local physician to have a prescription filed for my high blood pressure. During that visit I was asking a lot of questions in regard to stroke problems so his Physician’s assistant noticed I was over 50 (I am 51) and scheduled a full physical for my next visit. I had the works that day, stress test, EKG, prostrate exam, UA, and any thing else they could think of. Went home knowing that I had passed all these test in flying colors and felt real good.
When I got home I saw that the doctor’s office had been trying to call me all afternoon and wondered what that was all about, at 6:30 PM that night she called back and said they had found blood in my UA and I needed to start taking Antibiotics to see if I had an infection. Went back in 2 weeks and had another UA and still had blood so then I was sent to a Urologist for more test. After several x-rays reveled no kidney problems or stones the doctor did a cysto. in the office and found a diverticulum on my bladder and did not like what he saw inside that. I went in for a Biopsy that Friday and he removed the growths inside the diverticulum, the biopsy came back level 3 cancer. At this point I still had no symptoms at all, so this was all very hard to understand why and accept that I had a real problem.
After a lot of crying my wife and I came to somewhat of an understanding and things are a little better. She is the aggressive one making sure the doctors are doing everything they can and my treatments are going OK. We are still having some problems working out our feelings; I am trying very hard not to feel sorry for myself and have become very bitchy, which is hard for her to take.
My doctor finally decided on a game plan and that felt a lot better, 6 weeks of chemo. then surgery to remove the diverticulum and have all this behind me. I had my first treatment a week ago and had no problems what so ever until about 3:00 AM on Saturday when I awoke with the urge to go and found blood. My first real symptom, I called and the doctor on call and he sent me to the emergency room, after 3 hours of the most horrible pain they finally inserted a catheter and I had some relief. What I did not know is that this was the first of a 4-day event; I ended up in the hospital on Sunday and was there until Tuesday. They could not get a catheter big enough to remove the blood clots in my bladder, after 5 attempts they were successful and then 24 hours of irrigation to clean the bladder out I went home.
I am at home searching the internet for answers and trying to figure out what will happen in the future, probably not a good thing to be doing however I can not seem to stop looking for answers and accept the truth. One doctor during the hospital stay said no more Chemo. then my doctor came back into town and he is saying wait one week and start over. I am very scared to do another treatment because I do not want to go through this again it hurts too much. I have to face the facts however that I must go through some treatment to remove this problem.

Doyle Graham, Jr.