Day -6

Afternoon at  Northwestern!

Met with Lucy, the transplant coordinator first.  She went over all the details of the chemo and transplant.  A lot of information, some a bit scary, but also some very reassuring answers to our MANY questions.

Upon arriving we had a wonderful gift bag from Carolyn, a fellow transplant recipient, waiting for us before our appointments!   It contained an example of a modified t-shirt that her sister made her with snaps to help make showering and dressing easier, along with Bill's favorite hard candy.  ( I am not sure how she knew).  And a beautiful card of support filled with tips for Bill to survive the hospital stay and tips for me of nearby places in case I need a  change of atmosphere from the hospital.  How extremely thoughtful and so very much appreciated!   You never know how the people you meet one day will greatly touch your life years later!

Next he had his blood drawn and was so happy to have Sam in the clinic to do it.  Sam gave him his mozabil shots everyday during the harvesting!   Sometimes I wonder if these clinicians realize how much their kindness, their reassuring smiles, or  taking just an extra minute of time  can mean the world to the patient .  We have experienced the most amazing nurses, technicians, doctors, volunteers, etc who have made this journey so much easier!

Finally appointment with Dr. Mehta, the transplant doctor.  He is an extremely intelligent and personable doctor.  And also very patient with my 101 questions!  So they collected 11.16 million stem cells during 4 days.  These cells have been  separated into 8 bags ranging from 1.5 - 2.5 million in each bag.  Then doctor Mehta decides which bags to infuse for the transplant.  He explained they can transplant as few as 2 million or as many as 5 million.  Any thing over that is overkill.  The difference is how fast of a jump start they give your immune system before it  kicks back into gear.  He has decided to transplant  3 bags totalling just over 4 million.  This then allows the other 7 million to stay frozen for 2 more future transplants if needed.  So I am sure you are wondering , just like me, how they defrost the bags of frozen stem cells!  Dr. Mehta's response was "VERY carefully", with a slight chuckle!  They put them in bath water of exactly what your body temperature is for about 15 minutes!

So............  we are a GO for Monday morning! 

On the way home we stopped for dinner ( white blood count  in the normal range) at Uncle Julios followed with a stop at Marshals for bargain T-shirts that I can put snaps in.  We had more fun at the clearance shirt rack.  We found a lot of VERY ugly shirts but some that will work great!  Even found a Northwestern t-shirt!!!! How very appropriate and only $5.00. 

Sorry for rambling tonight but thank you for joining us on Bill's journey!  We could not do this without each and everyone of you!


Kay