Transplant and TNT

A few days before I was diagnosed Ross got a piece of mail from Team in Training to do a marathon. We talked about since we both had lost someone to leukemia and thought that it would be a great idea if he did it. I didn't think that I would be strong enough to do a marathon. Boy, was I wrong. I think I went through a couple of marathons. Within a couple of days of me diagnosed Ross decided that he would do the Portland Marathon because if I could fight the battle, he would run for it.
A few days before I was going to go in for transplant Team and Training was having the kickoff party for the marathon. I was there as Ross' honored teammate, not really knowing what that really meant. I was very bald at this point so it was pretty obvious that I was a cancer patient. This lady walked up to me asking who I was and if I would be interested in talking. I thought that if I could be strong enough to battle cancer that I would be able to talk in front of a large crowd not really knowing what the size of the group would be. I have always had a fear of talking in front of people, so this was a big step. My mentality had changed and I looked forward to conquering my fears. I got up to speak and it was a very slow moving in my mind. I spoke from the heart and broke down right in front of everyone. The not knowing what was going to happen to me with the transplant was freaking me out. I never had a standing ovation before. It was a great feeling but so hard to get through. Now onto the transplant. The first day was really hectic. I got admitted, when and got my port put in that hurt like no ones business. They screwed up when they were putting it in. I am not sure what they did wrong but even with the medicition that they gave me I could still feel the pain. Then I was off to the radition department and that's where it got intresting. I was there to get fitted for lung blocks that were going to protect me from the radition. I just thought about this, maybe that is why it is so hard for me to breathe when I am going up a flight of stairs. I will get back to that later. They put you on a bicycle seat with this plexy glass around you and tell you to hold onto the railing. It isn't comfortable and I don't know how I am going to stand like this for 45 minutes to an hour. So I standing there getting prepared to be fitted and all the sudden I feel my world closing in around me. I said out load "I think that I am going to faint." Sure enough I did. Apparently, I wouldn't let go of the railings. When I did wake up I found this man standing very close to my face and he had been pounding on my chest to wake me up. In a very short time my poor chest had been through a lot and I only had been a there a couple of hours. This process wasn't starting off very well. The next couple of days I would do radition that wasn't as bad as I thought. I was really scared to do it, because I never heard anything good about radition. There were so many side effects that I am still not looking forward to. I had four days, twice a day for radition and getting chemo as well. It took a few days for the side effects to set in. The radition and chemo took it all out of me. The two treatments had killed my immune system and stem cells. I was at that point, my insides were all gone. On May 31st, I received the stem cells transplant. It wasn't as exciting as I thought. It was a bag of her stem cells that would go into my port, but it was the most important day of my life. I was going to live! :-) I decided on June 4th that I was going to get out on the 14th. Since every case is different they tell you that you are going to be hospitalized from four to eight weeks. I thought that was way too long and I was going to get out of there way before that. If you know me, I love to set timelines and goals for things to happen. I never doubted for a second that the transplant wouldn't take. I didn't know what my chances were for the transplant not taking. In a few months I would learn a very hard way that the transplants don't always take. There isn't much that I remember about the transplant stay. I am sure that I was on good medications. I am sure that I had good days and bad days. I could have keep a long but if I know myself, it probably wouldn't have made much sense. I do remember one day I was walking around the ward and this woman was in room with a patient. I am assuming that it was a mother and daughter and the daughter was the patient. The mother asked me how many days it had been since my transplant. I think that it was a couple of days after my transplant. Anyways, I told her and she turned to her daughter and said see she is out walking around. I wasn't sure what the conversation between them was about. So I went walking around the ward and stopped at the board that listed all of our names and how far we were out of transplant. The girl that I had talked to was about a week more than I was. I later found out that she hadn't even gotten out of her bed to go walking. In order for you to go home you need to walk, eat, poop and not be hooked up to meds. She was one of those people that were going to be there four to eight weeks. It made me strong and push harder to get home. Everything was a success! The transplant was only half the battle. June, July and August were harder than the four months before. You know what to look forward to on the next blog.