We got good news yesterday, all my normal blood tests were normal, and so they went forward with removing my central line yesterday afternoon. We had our exit interview and were released from LDS Hospital care. We'll be packing up today and plan on taking to the highway tomorrow morning that will put us back in Vegas sometime this weekend. We are ready to come home.
I'm not completely finished with doctors yet. I have an appointment with Dr. Te next week and at day 100 (currently about day 31) I get another complete round of blood and other tests to determine just how good everyting went this time around and they plan for my maintenance medicines and procedures that I'll have to do for a while. So keep us in your thoughts and prayers for a few more weeks at least to help with this phase of the process then hopefully we'll be in great shape and hear the "full remission" words we are waiting for.
Thank you for all your support and until next time, hope everyone is safe and well.
Thursday, July 21, 2011
Wednesday, July 13, 2011
7/13/2011 Playing the waiting game again
As I wrote last week, I got out of the hospital a few days earlier than I thought I would and several days sooner than I did last time in April. I think that was a good thing, but it remains to be seen. I'm not as strong as I was last time and I think that follows up with what happened this week.
Don't get me wrong, I believe I was ready to get out of the hospital when I did, they were keeping a 24/7 watch on me, but I don't think it was needed any more this time around which has been backed up by how I'm doing.
It was real nice for Amanda to come up and see us last week and weekend and I was real glad she was able to make it out to see the Pronk family, we would have wanted to go but I have to be pretty careful right now. Amanda said they were all doing pretty well.
So back to me, We met with the doctors yesterday (Tues. July 12th) and didn't really know what to expect going in but many of them were trying to get my line removed and to get the exit interview at the end of this week. - Well, that's not what is going to happen. This is how we are expecting things to go if my mind and body follow the plan. Next Wednesday morning I will go into the clinic to get what is hopefully my last set of labs for a while. Then just after noon, we'll have our exit interview with the medical staff and if everything goes well with that, they'll send me downstairs to get my line removed and they will kick me loose to go back to the care of Dr. Te in St. George until about day 100 when they will run all the labs and tests again to see how we did this time about getting all the little buggers. Hopefully things will be good enough that I'll just have some maintenance medication for a while and can achieve a full remission.
If all goes as planned, we should be leaving Salt Lake Friday morning July 22 to start heading south. Since it's the holiday weekend we haven't really talked about how long it will take us to get to Vegas, but I suspect it will be a couple of days.
We'll write again next week after plans are finaled or we know anything else to tell everyone.
Don't get me wrong, I believe I was ready to get out of the hospital when I did, they were keeping a 24/7 watch on me, but I don't think it was needed any more this time around which has been backed up by how I'm doing.
It was real nice for Amanda to come up and see us last week and weekend and I was real glad she was able to make it out to see the Pronk family, we would have wanted to go but I have to be pretty careful right now. Amanda said they were all doing pretty well.
So back to me, We met with the doctors yesterday (Tues. July 12th) and didn't really know what to expect going in but many of them were trying to get my line removed and to get the exit interview at the end of this week. - Well, that's not what is going to happen. This is how we are expecting things to go if my mind and body follow the plan. Next Wednesday morning I will go into the clinic to get what is hopefully my last set of labs for a while. Then just after noon, we'll have our exit interview with the medical staff and if everything goes well with that, they'll send me downstairs to get my line removed and they will kick me loose to go back to the care of Dr. Te in St. George until about day 100 when they will run all the labs and tests again to see how we did this time about getting all the little buggers. Hopefully things will be good enough that I'll just have some maintenance medication for a while and can achieve a full remission.
If all goes as planned, we should be leaving Salt Lake Friday morning July 22 to start heading south. Since it's the holiday weekend we haven't really talked about how long it will take us to get to Vegas, but I suspect it will be a couple of days.
We'll write again next week after plans are finaled or we know anything else to tell everyone.
Monday, July 4, 2011
7/4/2011 Independence Day +1
I got a pleasant surprise yesterday on the 3rd. Everyone was happy with how my numbers were looking and they kicked me out of the hospital. I kind of thought it might be coming but didn't dare speculate incase it didn't happen.
Although, I almost went AWOL the day before on Saturday. Something happened to the air conditioning system throughout the hospital and most of the rooms were in the 85 - 90 degree range that wasn't good for many of the patients up there. some of us found a little corner or a room that for some reason was working and was much cooler than the rest of the place. Patty and I took a spot in the waiting room of the BMT Clinic and watched a movie but that was lucky for us, there were some patients with fevers that the staff was really working hard to keep stable. They said the ICU and the NICU were both affected, but we never heard of any bad news, that was very fortunate. They had A/C workers up on the roof working on it and finally got it fixed so we could all go back to our rooms, but they were waiting a while before taking some patients back to be careful.
So, yesterday July 3rd they got me ready to go home, somehow I had eaten enough for them and I had drank enough liquids for them to let me go. I guess I am one of a very small group of patients that get out of there without having a red blood cell transfusion, which is OK with me. I had two units of platelets but that was all.
Patty came up and while she was there, they let me go. I came back to the apartment and went in for a nap that other than waking up to eat and use the facilities a couple of times got over about 11:00 am this morning July 4th, so I had to leave the hospital to get the rest I really need.
Now I don't know what we are going to do about watching some fireworks, maybe we won't since they'll all be past my bedtime anyway.
I am losing most of my hair again, it just started of the past couple of days, I'll probably find a barbershop on Tuesday to take everthing down to the number 2 blade length again.
I have an appointment at the clinic tomorrow morning, that should give me a better idea as to how long we will be expected to stay in Salt Lake. I don't know what their perameters for sending me home will be exactly. I still have the Central Line Catheter in and don't expect they will order it to be taken out until next week some time when they are certain I'm ready to go.
We'll let you know as we know more. I think Amanda is coming up to see us for a few days, that will be very nice. We do thank everyone for their thoughts and prayers, I know they helped.
Although, I almost went AWOL the day before on Saturday. Something happened to the air conditioning system throughout the hospital and most of the rooms were in the 85 - 90 degree range that wasn't good for many of the patients up there. some of us found a little corner or a room that for some reason was working and was much cooler than the rest of the place. Patty and I took a spot in the waiting room of the BMT Clinic and watched a movie but that was lucky for us, there were some patients with fevers that the staff was really working hard to keep stable. They said the ICU and the NICU were both affected, but we never heard of any bad news, that was very fortunate. They had A/C workers up on the roof working on it and finally got it fixed so we could all go back to our rooms, but they were waiting a while before taking some patients back to be careful.
So, yesterday July 3rd they got me ready to go home, somehow I had eaten enough for them and I had drank enough liquids for them to let me go. I guess I am one of a very small group of patients that get out of there without having a red blood cell transfusion, which is OK with me. I had two units of platelets but that was all.
Patty came up and while she was there, they let me go. I came back to the apartment and went in for a nap that other than waking up to eat and use the facilities a couple of times got over about 11:00 am this morning July 4th, so I had to leave the hospital to get the rest I really need.
Now I don't know what we are going to do about watching some fireworks, maybe we won't since they'll all be past my bedtime anyway.
I am losing most of my hair again, it just started of the past couple of days, I'll probably find a barbershop on Tuesday to take everthing down to the number 2 blade length again.
I have an appointment at the clinic tomorrow morning, that should give me a better idea as to how long we will be expected to stay in Salt Lake. I don't know what their perameters for sending me home will be exactly. I still have the Central Line Catheter in and don't expect they will order it to be taken out until next week some time when they are certain I'm ready to go.
We'll let you know as we know more. I think Amanda is coming up to see us for a few days, that will be very nice. We do thank everyone for their thoughts and prayers, I know they helped.
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