So today my pain is probably a 0.5/5 on the pain scale. Not quite a full zero, but less than a one. These days happen only rarely, but when they do it's like the sun is shining more brightly, the birds are chirping louder, spring is in the air...Life is just awesome. It's hard to remember life before chronic pain, but when it happens nowadays it's such a gift.

I've seen others giving similar descriptions of their pain free days. Feeling that everything is possible, everything is beautiful, life is wonderful, etc. etc.

I actually broke down and had a tear about ten minutes ago, being without pain is that powerful. I think I've cried maybe five times in my adult life, I didn't even cry when all my grandparents died. But a pain free day...That's another story.

Sometimes reading your posts puts things into perspective for me. I would say im on a .5 of 5 daily. Really just minor discomfort usually.....never pai in prostate, discomfort in urethra and testes very occassionaly. Makes me think i dont have chronic prostatitis.....actually, my uro is leaning more towrds the seminal vesicals having infection. As much as I hate what i have....you guys have it worse...good luck!!!

Happy to hear that you guys are feeling well these days especially you Freakinfrustrated. I've been effectively managing my symptoms for the past few months now. I'm 90-95% feeling ok most of the time. The strict candida diet that I follow which I'm on my 5th week now together with the Candida stop supplement has been working great for me. I trust that I can completely put this sad chapter in my life behind me pretty soon. Lets continue to stay positive and look forward for our complete healing. It's mind over matter guys.

good to hear. Anything specific that you can point to that you attribute the improvement to?

I read about your experiments with NAC in the other thread. It will be interesting to see to which extent it is contributing to your improvement.

Yeah, I have also been having some pain free or very low discomfort days myself...I tell you this, this condition has definitely opened my eyes again...I cared about the wrong things and let those things determine my day. Now, Im just happy to feel normal like in the past and appreciate the day....It always wonderful to read posts like this and very glad everyone is feeling better to enjoy this spring and summer because last spring and summer was the WORSE!!!...I was like a walking zombie detached from the world except for this forum of course...God Bless

I have been on flagyl for 2 weeks and maybe thats helping a bit...its not getting rid of urethritis but everything else. Limiting ejaculating to 1 time a week.....thats probably the bigges thing. After ejaculation everything is red and irritated. No spicy food...1 coffee a day. Just little thing that keep discomfort to a minimum.

My pain free day was a one day thing as I'm back to a more typical 1-2/5 level. But at least it's below a 3/5, that's where quality of life really starts to take a hit. It's kind of frustrating trying to figure out what was special about Sunday where there was virtually no pain vs. more typical days. Two things come to mind:

1. Since it's the weekend I'm not sitting at a desk at work. All Saturday I was physical outside doing gardening and other chores. I didn't sit at all, either did standing-type chores or else was lying down. I know sitting for long periods is not good for it.

2. Had sex Saturday night. With both of our busy schedules that sort of thing usually only happens on the weekend. Regular old sex seems to make mine feel better most of the time. Self-treatment?...that usually makes things worse.

Both 1 and 2 are possible explanations. It could even be a combination of both.

454, in some of your previous posts from the last month or two, you stated that self-internal work was helping you more than anything else you'd tried up to this point. IIRC, you were doing some internal stretching while in the shower. Are you still doing this and is it helping? In your latest post, you've said that self-treatment normally makes things worse... trying to work out whether you're referring to internal stretching or masturbating!!!

Haha, yes, "self-treatment" was masturbation for that particular reference. I'll have to be more clear about that distinction in the future. *Real* actual "self-treatment"...i.e., self internal massaging, is still by far the biggest lifesaver for me. I do it almost daily with great success and will continue to do so until I'm cured or until I die, whichever comes first.

Since my latest flare-up has settled down again I am doing pretty well now. Pain around a 1/5 even after masturbation which is nice. This leaves me with the following conclusion for my last flare-up:

1. Maybe it was all due to the rigorous prostate massage, perhaps I managed to bruise the prostate or at least irritate it. Or perhaps I even managed to dislodge some sort of infected material that caused a big flare-up - I'm skeptical of that though as I didn't have any other signs of infection like blood in semen or fever or sore joints.

I also have had three supplement variables that changed about the same time of the flare-up/die-down:

1. I stopped taking NAC around the time of the prostate massage and flare-up. I have since re-started and it sort of coincides with the die-down of the flare. I will test this theory further by stopping NAC again once everything is settled out for a while.

2. At the same time as re-starting NAC, I also started taking Graminix pollen extract. I have never taken this before, and I have about 6 more weeks to go, so I'll continue that until I run out and see what happens to my symptoms as I roll off it.

3. I am also testing out the supplement Q-Urol - started the same day that I re-started NAC and started taking the pollen extract. I only have 21 days left, so this will be the first of the three supplements I roll off of and watch for any changes.

So I'm pretty busy right now. I'll have to manage the end-dates of all three of those supplements individually so that they don't coincide and cause confusion as to what might be responsible for any change of symptoms.

Oh and Monday I'm driving 5 hours to Philly for a visit to Doctor Pontari...who is supposedly a prostatitis expert. We'll see what comes of that. I'm not particularly optimistic however it's a box I have to at least check off.

It can be really difficult to assess the effects of supps. There are many confounding factors and symptoms seem to evolve randomly. I appreciate your efforts in trying to discern the value of those three.

I'm a believer the answer is out there 454 we just need to keep looking, well probably anyway, I like to say the answer is out there every now and again because it reminds me of the x files.

Isn't qurol like mostly the same as graminex anyway? forgive my ignorance if I have it wrong.

I'm pretty sure your right Chris. I think it's prostaq + graminex