Hey all, back again with another quick update on my week. This morning’s meeting with my Docs has brought me one step closer to home as I am now an Out-Patient for the first time in about 2 weeks. My blood counts are continuing to improve and today they reached a point where I was able to be removed from my antibiotics, and they were the only obstacle standing in my way of a discharge. So this morning I was discharged, and starting tomorrow I’ll be visiting the “day hospital” to have my blood levels checked and to receive any additional meds I may need.
The big pieces of the “going home” puzzle right now involve me remaining infection/temp free for 48 hours, and to have my counts continue to rise. Whether or not I go home on Saturday our 30 Day Drive is coming to an end. Depending when you wish to start counting we are almost at the end or today is day 21 Post-Transplant, either way the next stage of my Journey is coming to a close. And at this time I feel I want to give you a little caption that lies ahead.
First thing is that it is very important for you all to know that we are still very early in this Journey. There are many many miles left to travel, a Transplant isn’t the end of the Journey it is really a beginning. Our focus will now start to switch on getting a “hard graft” as it is called, which involves getting my Dad’s stem cells producing very healthy blood, and getting my blood levels near or very near normal. That process has begun as my counts have started to rise nicely on their own, which is exactly what we want.
Once the “hard graft” has settled in and my counts are looking solid the next stage involves a disease I may have mentioned before called “Graft vs. Host Disease” (GVH or GVHD). GVH is the disease that results from my Dad’s cells – the graft – setting up shop inside me – the host. The disease can present itself it a number of ways, last Transplant I had a pretty extensive skin rash which was followed by a drop in my liver functions. GVH is one of those necessary evils, as it is very important to have some, as a theory suggests that GVH results in a Graft vs. Leukemia affect as well, and that is because most everyone’s immune-system has the ability to destroy Cancer. As we know mine has trouble with Leukemia, but hopefully my Dad’s doesn’t so with some GVH we should also get my Dad’s cells working to rid me of any
Leukemia that may still be in my blood. Make sense? I say GVH is a necessary evil because it is a tough disease and one that will most definitely see me receive a whole new host of drugs, and in extreme cases GVH is fatal, thus the importance of diagnosing and carefully treating it.
Enough of the technical stuff for now, back to the road ahead a little. I feel it’s important for you to know that I very possibly have a year in front of me where I will still be an active Patient, consistently in the hospital and seeing my Docs. My energy very possibly won’t be back to full levels until a year’s time, assuming there are no major complications, as it took almost 2 years after my first Transplant before I really felt like my old self, but that was largely due to my ICU stay.
So as we hit this next phase of my Journey, I want you all to know that we have some road left to travel yet and in fact it is the most important road of all. These next many miles will ideally see my Dad’s stem cells get really comfortable in my body, so comfortable that they want stay and to their job for say that next 50-60 years.
That’s my update for today, I’ll keep you posted on the rest of the week’s events and will be back soon.
Always…
Live Life. Love Life.
Geoff
