Prostate Cancer: My Grandfather's Secret Thoughts

An Operation for the Removal of the Prostate Gland, and its Effects, at the Age of 76

Who is there to whom one can talk intimately? I know of noone I could completely unburden myself to at the present time.

After five months since the date of the operation I can now pass urine perhaps normally at 77 years, say two hourly intervals, whereas it was every two minutes at worst, one hour at best. The surgeon had said that very soon the passage would be quite blocked.

At once all sexual feeling stopped. After fifty years with a loving wife, the thought of intercourse is now abhorrent. This is a shock for one who was healthy and normal, though never wishing for promiscuity. Sex is part of love; being now a celibate has proved this to me. respect and regard is still there. I once knew a lady dentist [in her] late 50s, who shook hands and smiled with her husband when business caused a parting for some weeks. I felt smugly sorry for them then. I could never have reached that step 'naturally' with my wife, before the op.

In a nutshell I would say that what would ordinarily happen in years (or gradual almost imperceptible aging) has taken place in five months. This in spite of the regaining of some strength since the operation. The great difference between the pre-operation days, and now, to my body and general health, to come so suddenly is depressing and sometimes frightening. I felt young, worked hard at physical labour, and talked, and people said looked young; now I am an old man, with most of the disabilities, tiredness, aches and pains, irritability etc usual in age […]. It is impossible to describe the strange feeling of something missing, and unusual working of the internal organs. Is it that the old body cannot adjust itself, or that something is still wrong, who knows?

An Old Postcard from Gorizia

I came across this postcard dated 4th October 1963. It is addressed to my eldest sister Valerie, as 4th October was her birthday, and in 1963 she would have been celebrating her seventeenth birthday.

The signatories are fascinating, and are all relations. I think the message is in the handwriting of my great aunt Maria, my grandmother's sister, but to be honest the writing is not quite the same as that of her signature, where she has signed 'tua Zia, Zia Maria'. The first half differs from the second half. It is then signed by my aunt Silvana. She had been living with us in the early 1960s, and perhaps was now staying with her aunt in Gorizia on a visit.

There is another signatory, who writes 'Auguri vivissimi buon compleanno cugina Livia', and vertically is the signature 'Pina Madriz'. These are all relations on my grandmother's side of the family.