The doctor delivered some good news yesterday, the complete results from last week's bone marrow biopsy. My bone marrow shows no signs of disease or even minimum residual disease (yay!) and there is no evidence of chimerism in my marrow either! Chimerism [the first part pronounced like the word 'sky' minus the 's,' as in ky-myrrh (like the incense)-ism] is the detection of two different genetic profiles in one sample. So, the test is essentially telling me that all of my bone marrow is gone, and the only thing which is left are the stem cells from the donor, my mom's cells. There is no mixture of my cells and her cells, which is good because that means there are no competing forces for space and resources in my marrow. Her cells get carte blanche to make my blood from now on!
Seemingly, they have made a little more hemoglobin for me since Monday, so I've got a little more energy than I did this time last week. Although, my stomach still does not like being bombarded with hand-fulls of pills every other hour, which forces me to take it easy. The doctor is also going to stop the IV fluids altogether. The less time I spend at the hospital, the less I am exposed to people with infections and the like. So, this weekend I'm free from any tethered tubing from a pole, as a test, and next week I may even get a few days off from having to go to the hospital at all, except for lab-work and, of course, seeing the good doctor.
It appears that they have learned that patients recover better at home than if they had remained bed-ridden... Ah! Twenty-First Century advances! Now where's that barbecue sandwich from last night... oh no, wait, today's Friday, time for tuna fish sandwiches and Lay's potato chips!
