[The following excerpts are from the "Guide To Getting It On!"-5th edition, by Paul Joannides. Illustrations are by the wonderful Daerick Gross, Sr.]
The prostate is located between the bottom of the bladder and the start of the penis. The urethra (tube you pee through) runs through the prostate like the Mississippi runs through the heartland. If you are thinking in three dimensions, the prostate wraps around the urethra like a donut around a straw, or your hand around your penis when your partner says, "Not tonight, dear."
The prostate is made up of smooth muscle fibers, connective tissue, small tubes, and clusters of glands that produce a clear fluid. If you find fruit metaphors helpful, the prostate is like an orange, with a tough skin and pulpy insides. The fluid from the prostate makes up around 30% of each ejaculation. As a guy is starting to ejaculate, the muscle fibers in the prostate squeeze the fluid from the tiny glands into the urethra.
Some people think of the prostate as a lump. However, as you can see from the diagram above, the prostate is a complex organ that has a number of different parts to it.
It is called BPH when your prostate gland is enlarged and physicians don't think you have cancer. The symptoms can range from mild to severe. One of the fascinating things about BPH is that the prostate can be greatly enlarged in a man who experiences no troubling symptoms, or it can be completely normal in size but the man is going through hell. In the latter case, the swelling might be on the inside of the prostate, clamping the urethra shut.
Prostatitis is a syndrome that can include pain in the pelvis, painful ejaculation, pain with erections, an array of urination problems, and pain with life in general. Some men say it feels like they've got a golf ball up their butt, and it's not because they were bending over and someone forgot to yell "fore!"
Prostatitis is often described as a young man's disease, yet it can pummel the pelvis of any man at any age. It can be caused by anything from an infection to chronic tension in the pelvis, although infection is found in less than 10% of all cases of prostatitis. To quote a recent article in the Journal of Urology, prostatitis is a syndrome that is "poorly defined, poorly understood, poorly treated, and bothersome." Or to quote our own prostate expert, "Prostatitis is a young guy's disease that is not diagnosed properly and is not treated properly."
If you've got a sudden, acute attack of pain in your pelvis, get yourself to a physician as soon as possible. This kind of prostatitis can usually be treated successfully.
If you have chronic prostate problems, educate yourself about prostatitis. A good source of information is The Prostatitis Foundation. Then, after you have an idea of just how many theories there are and how complex the problem can be, find a good urologist. The prostatitis.org website usually keeps a list of urologists with whom people have had positive experiences.
Since chronic prostatitis tends to wax and wane, a lot of men take course after course of antibiotics, thinking that the antibiotics helped it improve the last time around. This is not a good idea. You need to approach chronic prostatitis with patience and intelligence.
