Medical Musings: A Visit by an Angel

Friday, June 18, 2010

A Visit by an Angel

No, I haven't gone completely loopy. My laptop failed yesterday leaving me in utter despair. I live by the Ethernet!

Old friends loaned me a laptop until mine could be repaired. I can breathe again!

There are early signs of graft activity, and I feel a whole lot better than I did earlier this week, although I am thoroughly weak and keep forgetting to eat (that's possible on the cardboard diet they are feeding me).

5 comments:

AnonymousJune 18, 2010 at 8:31 PM
Miracles never cease! :) Lynne
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AnonymousJune 19, 2010 at 4:42 AM
You are remarkable, Lon. Keep up the good work. I'm certain that the angels are watching over you. I continue to keep you in my prayers. Roslyn.
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SandyJune 19, 2010 at 5:28 AM
Angels present themselves in a variety of ways... happy to hear there IS a Laptop Angel in your midst! Continuing to intend all good is coming your way...
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Nancy StewartJune 19, 2010 at 8:24 AM
Great news! Hopefully things will continue to improve as the days pass and that you won't develop all of the nasty side effects from the engraftment. It still amazes me how this whole process works - the cells know where to go and what to start doing.

Gooooo CELLS!!!
Nancy
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BarbaraJune 20, 2010 at 4:36 PM
Lon.. I am soooooooooo cheering you on in this
journey.. thank goodness you are able to stay connected.. here's hoping each day brings you a bit closer to full energy. all the best
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They spam, I moderate. When you send a comment, it will disappear for a bit until I am notified. It hasn't been eaten. On the plus side, I can now reply to questions or suggestions, if you have any, in the comments!

About Me

I have multiple myeloma, a rare, incurable, universally-fatal blood cancer. The average survival in 1998 for the newly-diagnosed was three years with conventional chemo, five years with a autologous bone-marrow transplant. Through a combination of diligent study and miraculous luck, I'm in good shape more nearly fourteen years later.

I've had just about every treatment medicine has to offer: chemotherapy, autologous transplant, allogeneic transplant from a matched but unrelated donor (a MUD), and a donor lymphocyte infusion (DLI).

I started blogging just before I was scheduled to have a second autologous transplant in early 2009, but there was too much cancer in the marrow. I was devastated. By November, my tumor burden was astronomically high: I had run out of time.

So I gambled on the rare and dangerous allogeneic transplant from a matched but unrelated donor, which is when I began this blog in earnest, but after a month I couldn't blog because I had become so weak I couldn't lift my hands to the keyboard. I was hospitalized for nearly three months; nearly died three times; and I continue in recovery more than a year later. My wife was once told to make "final arrangements" for me.

I wanted especially to describe my struggle with fear. Fear often leads to bad medical decisions: its acid eats away ones quality of life. Fear leads to too much treatment too soon, or to treatment too long delayed. I hope to explain the tools I've developed to neutralize it. I am writing a book on the subject which I hope to finish before I'm financially destitute: who plans to retire at age 53?

Along the way I'll try to provide the context of my life inside of which these tools work. Also, I can't resist the occasional digression.

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Friday, June 18, 2010

A Visit by an Angel

5 comments: