Slightly funnier than placebo
April 4, 2011 2:52 PM Subscribe
Those bearing XY chromosomes and those who love them will be thrilled to watch Manhood In The Mirror, a cautionary, educational parody about the importance of self-examination in the treatment of testicular cancer. Both text and video instructions for TSEs are available, as well as some background on the video itself. Brought to you by ZDoggMD, a medical satirist with other videos, such as Immunize!.
I can't do much about what or how or when YouTube chooses to advertise. If I could, I would, but I can't, so I won't.
posted by hippybear at 3:06 PM on April 4, 2011
posted by hippybear at 3:06 PM on April 4, 2011
I dunno. My balls have felt like a pair of cracked hard-boiled eggs ever since I had epididymal cysts at the age of 23. Smooth? Hah! The callouses on my big toes are smoother. I wouldn't have a clue if I had bollock cancer or not so I don't bother to check any more. Seriously, they feel like frozen brussels sprouts. There's no point in checking when checking just makes me think, "Fuck, my balls are a mess". And a bad Michael Jackson impersonation isn't likely to persuade me to reconsider. Hey, I made it to 52. Whatever takes me now can take me.
posted by Decani at 3:28 PM on April 4, 2011 [1 favorite]
posted by Decani at 3:28 PM on April 4, 2011 [1 favorite]
I now know 100% more intimate details than I ever wanted to know about Decani's balls.
(The metaphors were so good I still read the post twice)
posted by zephyr_words at 3:35 PM on April 4, 2011 [5 favorites]
(The metaphors were so good I still read the post twice)
posted by zephyr_words at 3:35 PM on April 4, 2011 [5 favorites]
Brussel sprouts? Seriously?
posted by leftcoastbob at 3:39 PM on April 4, 2011
posted by leftcoastbob at 3:39 PM on April 4, 2011
As Dylan Moran says, 'you're looking for a lump... in a bag of lumps.'
posted by permafrost at 3:51 PM on April 4, 2011 [2 favorites]
posted by permafrost at 3:51 PM on April 4, 2011 [2 favorites]
Just to say: been there, and very glad indeed I done that - when that little nugget didn't disappear after a week, I convinced myself to have it checked. I was 18, so the metastases had only been able to get so far along the lymphways up inside me.
All long past now, but: that instinct to trust your fingerspitzengefühl? I can't recommend it enough.
posted by progosk at 4:21 PM on April 4, 2011 [2 favorites]
All long past now, but: that instinct to trust your fingerspitzengefühl? I can't recommend it enough.
posted by progosk at 4:21 PM on April 4, 2011 [2 favorites]
Brussel sprouts? Seriously?
posted by leftcoastbob at 11:39 PM on April 4
Frozen brussels sprouts, dude. Those babies are rougher than W. H. Auden's face that time he tried to grow a beard and then accidentally glued a piece of extra-coarse sandpaper to his chin. The first time I read that testicles are supposed to feel smooth I felt myself up and promptly shat a brick, assumed I had cancer and made out my first last will and testament. As I mentioned, I was 23 at the time so my last will and testament went a bit like this:
I leave my shitty Columbus Les Paul copy to my sister, because she hates electric guitars, she's a Christian and I hate Christians.
I leave my record collection to Jumbo Records in Leeds Merrion Centre, because that's where most of it came from and hey, they'r'e nice people.
Oh fuck, that's all I own.
The contents of my scrotum still feel like at least three unshelled walnuts yet I remain mysteriously undead so, you know, I say this to young men terrified by the corrugated madness of their testes: get it checked out, dude, but don't sweat too much. Not everyone has smooth nads.
posted by Decani at 4:21 PM on April 4, 2011 [2 favorites]
posted by leftcoastbob at 11:39 PM on April 4
Frozen brussels sprouts, dude. Those babies are rougher than W. H. Auden's face that time he tried to grow a beard and then accidentally glued a piece of extra-coarse sandpaper to his chin. The first time I read that testicles are supposed to feel smooth I felt myself up and promptly shat a brick, assumed I had cancer and made out my first last will and testament. As I mentioned, I was 23 at the time so my last will and testament went a bit like this:
I leave my shitty Columbus Les Paul copy to my sister, because she hates electric guitars, she's a Christian and I hate Christians.
I leave my record collection to Jumbo Records in Leeds Merrion Centre, because that's where most of it came from and hey, they'r'e nice people.
Oh fuck, that's all I own.
The contents of my scrotum still feel like at least three unshelled walnuts yet I remain mysteriously undead so, you know, I say this to young men terrified by the corrugated madness of their testes: get it checked out, dude, but don't sweat too much. Not everyone has smooth nads.
posted by Decani at 4:21 PM on April 4, 2011 [2 favorites]
Hey progosk, same exact thing here, except I was 28. Actually, the first doc I saw was too incompetent to find the lump, so I had to force him to write the referral to radiology.
Gents, you want to catch this shit early...nothing is as unpleasant as trying to recover from being split from sternum to crotch, having your intestines placed on your chest, and 37 lymph nodes extracted.
posted by Existential Dread at 5:04 PM on April 4, 2011
Gents, you want to catch this shit early...nothing is as unpleasant as trying to recover from being split from sternum to crotch, having your intestines placed on your chest, and 37 lymph nodes extracted.
posted by Existential Dread at 5:04 PM on April 4, 2011
Sprouts? It must be Christmas.
posted by arcticseal at 5:10 PM on April 4, 2011
posted by arcticseal at 5:10 PM on April 4, 2011
I've heard the trick with brussel sprouts is to steam or smoke them. Boiling just makes ten tough and disgusting. Serve with walnuts and goat cheese.
posted by humanfont at 5:22 PM on April 4, 2011
posted by humanfont at 5:22 PM on April 4, 2011
three unshelled walnuts
Wait. Three? What are you, a pawn broker?
posted by SPrintF at 6:15 PM on April 4, 2011
Wait. Three? What are you, a pawn broker?
posted by SPrintF at 6:15 PM on April 4, 2011
I just finished three cycles of chemotherapy for TC that had spread into my lymph nodes. Managed to avoid the RPLND that Existential Dread mentions, but the tumor has managed to crush my inferior vena cava, so I still have some treatments at vascular surgery to get through.
I wholeheartedly approve of this and any approach to informing both men and women about this type of cancer. It's one that can be easily treated, if caught early enough, just by doing, with a little more care and attention to detail, what we all do most days anyway.
posted by zedbends at 7:05 PM on April 4, 2011 [1 favorite]
I wholeheartedly approve of this and any approach to informing both men and women about this type of cancer. It's one that can be easily treated, if caught early enough, just by doing, with a little more care and attention to detail, what we all do most days anyway.
posted by zedbends at 7:05 PM on April 4, 2011 [1 favorite]
get it checked out, dude, but don't sweat too much. Not everyone has smooth nads.
But! If you normally had smooth nads, and suddenly don't, or one of them gets inflamed or uncomfortable, get it checked!
Also, because I have a more-than-academic interest in this:
The Testicular Cancer Resource Center
tc-cancer.com and support forum
The slightly alarming increase in testicular cancer rates (pdf).
And while we are sharing, if you're worried about losing one of your boys, don't stress too much. The other one tends to develop compensatory hypertrophy to the point that it's like replacing two with one that's more than twice the size....and it can settle towards the middle so it's not super lopsided.
posted by Existential Dread at 7:08 PM on April 4, 2011 [1 favorite]
But! If you normally had smooth nads, and suddenly don't, or one of them gets inflamed or uncomfortable, get it checked!
Also, because I have a more-than-academic interest in this:
The Testicular Cancer Resource Center
tc-cancer.com and support forum
The slightly alarming increase in testicular cancer rates (pdf).
And while we are sharing, if you're worried about losing one of your boys, don't stress too much. The other one tends to develop compensatory hypertrophy to the point that it's like replacing two with one that's more than twice the size....and it can settle towards the middle so it's not super lopsided.
posted by Existential Dread at 7:08 PM on April 4, 2011 [1 favorite]
What Existential Dread said (and linked to) but also: Don't ignore things if there's no pain where there used to be. My offending tender bit used to be just that, always the more susceptible of the two to be screaming in agony when coming into contact with solid objects at speed (could've made out like a bandit on AFV if any had ever had a camera running). However, and I didn't realize this until after the diagnosis of TC was confirmed though an orchiectomy, at some point in the second half of last year it stopped being as sensitive as it once was. Lack of pain can be just as much of an indicator for a problem as excruciating pain, but it's not something that we generally associate with having to make a trip to the doctor for.
posted by zedbends at 7:25 PM on April 4, 2011
posted by zedbends at 7:25 PM on April 4, 2011
Don't ignore things if there's no pain where there used to be.
Whoa, interesting. When I look back, I noted that I developed horribly soaking night sweats for about 6 months before I found my tumor, 2-3 nights a week.
TC can be a bit of a chameleon. Since I had a mixed seminoma/non-seminoma tumor, it was found in pathology that three cycles of bleomycin/etoposide/cis-platin had killed all metastatic tumor cells, but I wound up with growing teratoma syndrome. Thus, the RPLND.
I thought I had caught mine early. Initial diagnosis was Stage I with no vascular involvement; from me finding the lump to orchiectomy was only 3 weeks. Then the unpleasant surprise of elevated tumor markers showing up four months later leading to 9 hellish weeks of chemo....then the CT showing an enlarged lymph node requiring RPLND. And now, two+ blessed years of freedom.
posted by Existential Dread at 7:46 PM on April 4, 2011
Whoa, interesting. When I look back, I noted that I developed horribly soaking night sweats for about 6 months before I found my tumor, 2-3 nights a week.
TC can be a bit of a chameleon. Since I had a mixed seminoma/non-seminoma tumor, it was found in pathology that three cycles of bleomycin/etoposide/cis-platin had killed all metastatic tumor cells, but I wound up with growing teratoma syndrome. Thus, the RPLND.
I thought I had caught mine early. Initial diagnosis was Stage I with no vascular involvement; from me finding the lump to orchiectomy was only 3 weeks. Then the unpleasant surprise of elevated tumor markers showing up four months later leading to 9 hellish weeks of chemo....then the CT showing an enlarged lymph node requiring RPLND. And now, two+ blessed years of freedom.
posted by Existential Dread at 7:46 PM on April 4, 2011
Balls are weird.
I think we don't need to call those things that make us men weird anymore. For too long the man has been putting us down, making us think our bodies . . .
Ok, they are weird.
posted by Ironmouth at 9:10 PM on April 4, 2011
I think we don't need to call those things that make us men weird anymore. For too long the man has been putting us down, making us think our bodies . . .
Ok, they are weird.
posted by Ironmouth at 9:10 PM on April 4, 2011
Hearing these stories, I'm soo glad I traded mine in when I did.
at least the twins are not quite so... delicate when handled.
posted by tigrrrlily at 5:35 AM on April 5, 2011
at least the twins are not quite so... delicate when handled.
posted by tigrrrlily at 5:35 AM on April 5, 2011
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posted by maudlin at 3:03 PM on April 4, 2011