Ugh

Wow, I’m emerging out of a very dark place. I’ll try to describe all that’s happened since my last post, but I may not be the most reliable witness.

After the three days of chemo pills – Busalfan – I had four days of infusions of IV chemo drugs – Melphalan and Thiotepa. These gave me extreme nausea round-the-clock, so by Sunday the transplant team admitted me to the hospital (UW Medical Center) to keep me sedated and hydrated.

Monday they transplanted the stem cells back in to me. From what little I recall, the transplant itself was no big deal and was fairly anti-climactic. The most interesting feature was that everything tasted like garlic for a day, and I apparently smelled pretty bad too.

The transplant was a week ago, and I’m still here in the hospital, partly so they can keep me more comfortable in terms of nausea and pain, but mainly because I have ZERO white blood cells. We’re waiting for the stem cells to re-graft so they can start to rebuild my immune system.

Thanks for all the good thoughts, prayers and help from so many of you! And forgive the typos. They've got me pretty loopy from pain meds these days. :)

Law and Order

I can safely assure you all the I have now seen every eopisode of "Law and Order" ever produced. If you have basic cable, you can find an epidose of "Law and Order" at any hour of the day. It's a proven fact.

I'm bored. I'm also sedated much of the time by the antinausea meds, so find it hard to pursue much beyond bad cable crime dramas.

I've almost finished day 3 of the chemo, which is a drug called Busalfan. I take it (along with anti-nausea meds) round the clock. Harry has the unenviable job of waking me up in the middle of the night and keeping track of what I took when.

Starting tomorrow, I'll start getting 2 days of nasty IV chemo, Melphalan, followed by 2 days of infusion of another drug called Thiotepa.

Transplant day is Monday the 12th. the doctors call it "Day Zero", but that sounds a little ominous somehow.

I have a feeling the next 4 days are going to be rough.

Lost in Transplantation

I started the pre-transplant process on Saturday, and things are going very well.

Saturday, Sunday and Monday, I gave myself daily injections to kick my bone marrow into high gear. I felt mostly ok – just a little tired and head-achey. Monday night I got a drug that is designed to push all the stem cells from my bone marrow out into my bloodstream. That shot left me feeling pretty terrible, but it definitely did its work.

On Tuesday morning, I started the “harvest” (the technical term is apheresis). The harvest was scheduled to occur over three days, but my over-achieving bone marrow kicked out double the amount of stem cells they need in just one morning. I felt pretty crummy till about mid-day Wednesday from all the spiking and crashing of my blood counts, but I felt great today.

The next step is to start the high-dose chemo this weekend. My mom will be arriving on Saturday morning to keep us all in line.

Thanks for all your encouragement and support!