Day 50
Since it has been several days, I thought I might give you an update on John. Given what he has, he is doing as well as anyone could. He finished his first round of “consolidation” chemotherapy Friday evening and so far has suffered only one bad bout of nausea - one I might add that was not attributable to my cooking! He has none of the rashes that covered his body the last time and no swelling in his feet. His heart test was fine and we see no evidence that the chemo has damaged any organs. They make every patient write his name and try to pat his head and rub his stomach on each visit to see if motor skills have been affected. For John, they just ask how his drawing is going.
There are other long-term effects from chemotherapy that can occur. You may have read that Susan Sontag died of AML this past week. Hers was an aftereffect from chemotherapy she took back in the 1970s.
John continues to take each day at a time with patience. He is occasionally a bit irritable, but who wouldn’t be with the things going on inside him. He spent much of the weekend updating his website and adding a chat room feature. While everyone else has been headed back to school, he and a friend have been creating a card game to use in teaching history to students. Each card has a picture of a famous person and a use in the game that is based on what the person is famous for. It is really very funny and quite creative.
We have an appointment in Seattle on Wednesday, February 2 with the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Center. It is the leading bone marrow transplant clinic in the world and the one with the best record for success. John should be able to travel again by then if he stays “healthy.” In the meantime, he has two checkups next week and we will meet with Emory’s bone marrow transplant team on Friday.
Emory has started the donor search process, though the results are transferable to wherever we have the transplant done. They have chosen 6 candidates from the computer search of the database. All are males from the US and the oldest is 42. The protocols are that the national center contacts the local center where the candidate is, which then locates the candidate and obtains a fresh blood sample to retest and to check for any other diseases. All this means that we are at least a month or so away, but we are fortunate that John has responded to his treatments, so time is not as critical for him as it is for some.
Please keep us in your thoughts.
There are other long-term effects from chemotherapy that can occur. You may have read that Susan Sontag died of AML this past week. Hers was an aftereffect from chemotherapy she took back in the 1970s.
John continues to take each day at a time with patience. He is occasionally a bit irritable, but who wouldn’t be with the things going on inside him. He spent much of the weekend updating his website and adding a chat room feature. While everyone else has been headed back to school, he and a friend have been creating a card game to use in teaching history to students. Each card has a picture of a famous person and a use in the game that is based on what the person is famous for. It is really very funny and quite creative.
We have an appointment in Seattle on Wednesday, February 2 with the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Center. It is the leading bone marrow transplant clinic in the world and the one with the best record for success. John should be able to travel again by then if he stays “healthy.” In the meantime, he has two checkups next week and we will meet with Emory’s bone marrow transplant team on Friday.
Emory has started the donor search process, though the results are transferable to wherever we have the transplant done. They have chosen 6 candidates from the computer search of the database. All are males from the US and the oldest is 42. The protocols are that the national center contacts the local center where the candidate is, which then locates the candidate and obtains a fresh blood sample to retest and to check for any other diseases. All this means that we are at least a month or so away, but we are fortunate that John has responded to his treatments, so time is not as critical for him as it is for some.
Please keep us in your thoughts.
