My doctors are bothered that the overall cancer count is still too high. I have an aggressive version of multiple myeloma that will hopefully be taken care of by the transplant process. But the data collection period is over for now. I don’t have cancer cells in the spinal fluid, the number of cells has reduced and I’m not sick so the plan is to carry on with the transplant next week!
This Tuesday, I’ll be receiving a high dose of chemotherapy called Melphalan. It will destroy my battered bone marrow and all of the cancer cells within it. It also destroys my white blood cells and a few other things.
I will be tired, not very hungry and feel kind of sick but it’s not a seriously dangerous time. I’ll have to carefully watch out for bacteria or things that can make me sick but I’ll still be functioning just fine. The only concern is from getting a laundry list of side effects that come with any chemotherapy. Others who have gone through this say it’s really not that bad.
Two days after chemo treatment, my own stem cells will be injected and within a couple weeks, they will regrow the marrow, the immune system will reboot and I’ll be as good as new (almost). That’s the summary of transplant number one, starting one week from yesterday.
As for transplant number two, using donor stem cells, I just received some news that my siblings do not match with me. Also, my earlier report that I had 150 matches was not correct. I have 137 near matches. After further testing, it will be determined how many exact matches are out there for me. The doctor said there is a very high probability that I will find an exact match.
Transplant number two won’t begin for at least 45 days after transplant number one has taken place so there will be a lot of time to find that perfect donor.
This morning, they plan to insert two lines that will access blood near my heart. It's a minor surgical procedure. Other than that, I'm just looking forward to transplant number one.
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