Thank God that I began the stem-cell transplant process... but oh! it's been draining. I checked into the Ronald Reagan Medical Hospital (room 6125) on Monday and began getting radiation treatments twice a day since then.
The radiation is x-rays -- just like the ones they take pictures of your bones with using about 0.02 rads. Each dose for me is about 165 rads, not enough to burn skin, but enough to start tearing down my old blood factory. So they wheel me off at 4 am and 8 pm and make me lie down for about 20 minutes on my side, then flip me over to the other side for another 20 minutes. Did I mention that they use tape to keep me from moving? Not fun.
Fortunately, there haven't been a lot of side-effects yet. Some nausea and headaches, and I'm in and out of sleep a lot of the day. My appetite had been ok, but now nothing really sounds good. I brought all this stuff to do, but my energy is so low it's all pretty useless. So I'm feeling very blah, blah, blah... and I'm only getting this post out because Mike is ghost-writing as me. (Did anyone notice the style change?)
So my last radiation dose is coming early today (around 4:30 pm). Tomorrow and the next day I get some chemo, and then my white blood counts should drop to zero (they're at 4.62 today). Tuesday should be my new birthday, being the introduction of the cord-blood cells into my body. And after that comes the longer road of recovery...
He asked me, "Son of man, can these bones live?"
I said, "O Sovereign LORD, you alone know." Then he said to me, "Prophesy to these bones and say to them, 'Dry bones, hear the word of the LORD! This is what the Sovereign LORD says to these bones: I will make breath enter you, and you will come to life...'"
Ezekiel 37:3b-5
Hope Notes from Krista and Mike is a journal of encouragement as this Christian mom, and supportive husband and caregiver, face the ups and downs of a stem cell transplant after recurring leukemia. Start at the beginning by clicking September 2008 in the archives and reading forward. It's not always pretty, but it's real. We pray you will be blessed by these passages in some way.
1 comment:
Hang in there, guys. We're praying that His strength would be perfected in your weakness, and that He will provide for all your needs according to His riches in glory.
Scott & Gina Aiken
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