10/18/2017 - Bone Marrow Transplant, Part 4

Release is in sight!  I’ve been through the valley, under a very merciful umbrella walking with the Lord, and with some absolutely fantastically wonderful joyful experiences in the midst of it.  I’ve asked God for opportunities to use me, the ways He’s “fearfully and wonderfully made me” and the ways He’s taught me to live, and I know that others have prayed that exact prayer for me as well, knowing this is a unique place to be planted for a time.  There are people I will relate to that many people cannot…  There will be many people caring for me that would have no reason to care for me otherwise…  There will be many people stuck with me that have no other choice…  and I hope that I can be an inspiration to them, an encouragement to them, I hope that I can make their choice of occupation a joy to them because they know how much I appreciate what they are doing to help me (and the rest of us here) through something we disparately need all the knowledge they have, and all the time they’ve spent learning and gaining experience in understanding how our frail bodies can somehow endure incredible rebirth processes…  The team here is amazing, and it has been wonderful meeting everyone from the nurses to doctors to maintenance to launderers to stockers to pharmacists to every kind of assistant to social workers to volunteers to other “inmates” to security and on and on and on…  They have all done such a wonderful job making sure I am fully taken care of and probably slightly over-monitored.  I just pray that I have been a joy for them to serve, because I appreciate so much what each of them has done for me…  it’s very humbling for me to ring a bell and say “I’m sorry, but I just threw up in there, could you please clean it up for me.”  Thankfully I wasn’t the “throw up” guy, and only lost my breakfast twice (so far) while I’ve been here…

So now that I feel pretty good, and my spirit wants to put pen to paper, I’d like to give an update on the last few days.  Many times, I’ve been dealing with nausea and just a constant yucky tummy, which made it difficult to write or keep up with certain things.  With low energy too, for a few days, I just mostly slept some of the best sleep I’ve had since we’ve had kids…  It’s like sitting in the recliner at home, with the sun just warming your arm and legs, full stomach after lunch, ball-game in the background where the Packers are up by 49 at the end of the 3rd quarter so there’s nothing to worry about there, and I didn’t have to move an inch to get any little bit more comfortable to let my eyes slip shut for a deep afternoon nap (nobody jumping on my gut 5 seconds after I shut my eyes, no executive judgements to make on who was playing with green ninja first, no reminders that the trash goes out tonight…).  I think those two days made up for about the last 10 years I’ve missed.

So, I think I left off on pretty much my best physically feeling day of the whole process (D+4).  I felt so great coming off of the side effects of the nausea meds that got quite a bit of exercise in, taking walks outside, doing my walking-dance laps around halls, and hitting the Rhoads7 stairwell (144 stairs) 5 times that day to Toby Mac’s “Move (Keep Walking)” pace.
Now remember, White Blood Cell counts (WBC) and ANC are the numbers everyone is concerned with … “They will go to zero…  don’t worry, they will get there...  they always go to zero…  everyone is at zero for at least a few days…”  Can’t tell you how many times I heard that, from how many people, but it was always followed by “and when they start coming back up, everything starts feeling better real quick.”  But, like I always do, I tended to ask everyone…  “but what if they don’t go to zero?”  Lots of different looks and reactions on that one, similar to “but what if I didn’t get wet walking in the rain.”

Absolute Neutropenic Count (ANC) < 1000 is bad, < 500 is really bad and there is a serious risk of infection and complications.  That’s why we have to be isolated in this range with special precautions.

Hemoglobin and Platelet counts where covered to, but not to exciting, so I left them out of this general summary.  Be happy to share with anyone especially interested though!

History:
D-1 (10/4) – WBC 5,700 & ANC 5,000 – Normal on my day of rest between Chemo and Stem Cells
D-0 (10/5) – WBC 10,600 & ANC 10,100 – Stem Cell Infusion day
D+1 (10/6) – WBC 12,500 & ANC 12,100 – Med regiments started, Compazine side-effects start
D+2 (10/7) – WBC 4,000 & ANC 4,000 – Compazine side-effects little worse
D+3 (10/8) – WBC 3,800 & ANC 3,700 – Compazine side-effects really bad, and got fixed.
D+4 (10/9) – WBC 2,500 & ANC 2,400 – Covered details in last post.
D+5 (10/10) – WBC 2,400 & ANC 2,360 – A little less energy this day, but not too bad.  Still enough to walk and dance (which helped with the nausea, now that I was one tool down in the kit to control it).  Did some walking outside and the stairs once, but nothing physically notable for the day.  Highlight of the day was an opportunity I had with a student nurse.  She took a training lesson on me got to hook up her first IV (I think) for my antibiotic drip.  She did very well, and afterwards asked if I wouldn’t mind answering some questions she had to ask as part of her classwork.  It was much more easy to say yes here since she had done such a good job, and I didn’t have much else going on the rest of the day, as opposed to the typical “please stay on the line to answer a few questions for our customer service survey.”  She caught up to me walking the halls and got out her TWO surveys, and we started.  It was a very pleasant discussion, and I think if ever there was an easier missionary opportunity in the world, I would be surprised.  The surveys were great, and I think they were focusing on positive aspects that people must have seen in relation to how faith and community are powerful support structures for those in difficult times, and how open people are to them.  The first survey spoke a lot about our relationships with our doctors, physicians and nurses; what our religious beliefs were; what kind of community support groups did we belong to, and how did they help us…  Then the second survey was straight up how does your faith impact or influence how you make health care decisions.  I was able to share about how our Christian faith influenced every decision we make, and involves all the communities of people we are invested it, and so through the scripted questions she asked me, I walked through the gospel of Jesus, how we seek guidance through Him in all of our health care decisions, even this one “was there ever a time your faith caused you to disagree with your health care provider’s suggestions?”  I had the opportunity to use every miracle I could remember as an example to an answer to one of the questions, and even add in how I believe 1 Peter tells us how our faith can tie together our difficult times of suffering to becoming closer to God when we need Him the most.  It was the best hour-long survey I ever took…  No doubt – God lined that one up…
D+6 (10/11) – WBC 100 & ANC 100 – Boom!  Big drop day…  Low energy day, light nausea all day, lots of napping.
D+7 (10/12) – WBC 100 & ANC 10 – Waiting for zero…  Same low energy, light nausea all day, spiking low-grade fever (considered very serious) a few times which cultures were drawn for.  Met another inmate on a hall walk who was very nice and reminded me of my good friend Joe, who had just gone through a BMT a few years ago.  It’s strange because I can imagine going through it with him now, that I’ve met Paul and he just reminds me so much of him.
D+8 (10/13) – WBC 100 & ANC 10 – Sleepy, yucky, feverish day…
D+9 (10/14) – WBC 100 & ANC 10 – Sleepy, yucky, feverish day…  Highlight: Jas came to visit!  What a blessing, just to have her here after so long, obviously…  We got to snuggle and watch “This is Us” together.  Cry a little, laugh a lot, and then…
D+10 (10/15) – WBC 400 & ANC 270 – Sleepy, yucky, feverish day…  Highlight: My hair’s falling out…  so weird, like I can’t even describe how it can be so weird.  So Jas helped trim me up handsome as she could…  And to top it off, the dreaded diarrhea started…  arg… totally wore out the tile between the bed and the pot for a few days…  (all good now though, whew!). 
D+11 (10/16) – WBC 1,500 & ANC 1,150 – Good day, celebrating the ANC jump with Jas and looking forward to making the discharge requirements.  Now just need to get fevers, poos and vitals lined out…  Big requirement is to have ANC > 1,000 for two days in a row.  Jas had to head back home today.  Highlight: Had one of the sweetest nurses you could ever get and we talked a bit about families and faith.  I can’t wait to talk with her more about the questions she has about God, Jesus and the Bible…  She has about the sweetest demeanor you could ever imagine, and Jasmine loved her since the first time we met her on my Chemo day…
D+12 (10/17) – WBC 3,500 & ANC 2,830 – Had some serious talks with the discharge doc about what we got to get in line, and It’s looking like Thursday 10/19 is a possible discharge day.

Major work is done…  Just need a little tune up to get me home…  Hope to see you all soon!