A journey in life - musings of a doctor, husband, dad, grandad, brother, and friend

It is good to be out of hospital after being in 47 days!  Out of the hospital now 7 days and good to be back with my wife and not having to 'survive' each day in the hospital.  Now, each day I go to IPOP  (the unit called "Inpatient/outpatient").  Lab drawn and any needs addressed from tranfusions to getting IV electrolytes, etc.  Progressing each day.  I am very deconditioned.  I am regaining strength slowly each day.  Currently getting over Graft vs Host disease.  A frequent complication where the donor cell are still 'attacking me'.  It is fine line since there should some GvH disease which helps the donor's cells 'get rid' of my cancerous cells.  Taking high dose steroids but that's the price to pay to get over the GvH disease. Engraftment has occurred!  Effectively, this means that Erika's stem cells have established.  So...Erika's stem cells are currently producing the white blood cells.  The other cell lines (red blood cells

Sorry about the GAP in updates (I am using some of Jan's FB posts as information since many days I was either too out of it or just too sick) - My last post was t-zero. Jan is typing for me. The transplant occurred while I was still being treated for streptococcal pneumonia. Erika produced more than plenty of stem cells for transplant. Here is the following list of evens that occurred: 103-104 fevers 2 days of high dose cytoxan (chemo), which wiped out fever cytokine syndrone occurred which led to fluid overload that caused atrial vibrilation with rapid ventricular rate,  acute kidney failure , which caused emergency dialysis. head to toe bright red rash clearing of rash with peeling  engraftment began with yet more bouts of fevers, rash, and edema had inflamation inside and outside. abdomen swelled so badly , couldn't breathe. began coughing up blood.  had to be intubated and put on a ventilator for 3 days many tests and procedures lungs were ok but had small bow