Dr. Te said the word - Remission

A week ago Friday, I had my monthly appointment with Dr. Te. I ended up going up by myself because of many things. Patty had a procedure earlier in the week and still was feeling a little poor, so I convinced her that I could make it on my own. The trip went well and after taking care of a couple of items Friday, I was back on the road and made it home early Friday afternoon. , he went over the results of the blood work and tests that I had done for my one year after transplant. In general everything is doing very well and after going over the results of the bone biopsy pathology he said that I am technically in remission. He did add that since it was a sample from only one location, the odds are that some of the bad guys are probably still in there hiding. But I will take the good news, and keep eating a little poison every day to keep the little bad guys running and hiding for their lives - which I hope they lose. I am also still having Zometa on these every 4 week visits. The side effects from the Zometa are becoming pretty predictable - depending on how active I am on that Friday afternoon and Saturday. Traditionally, I feel pretty good until around 7 or 8:00 pm Saturday evening - sometimes sooner if I am very active. Anyway, around 8:00 pm, I start getting some aches in my legs, which get worse as the evening goes on. I take some tylenol or something that usually makes it a little better, then around bedtime, or an hour or so after going to bed, I usually get the cold shivers which last a couple of hours, then for the rest of the night I am over heated and spend most of the rest of the night throwing the covers off. Sunday morning I start feeling better, and by Sunday afternoon I am tired, but the aches are gone and I am usually feeling pretty well. I haven't got my orders going forward yet, Dr. Te is going to contact the LDS Hospital doctors to get a list of what and when I can start getting shots for all the things that were taken out when I got the heavy chemo last year. I think I have a lot of vacinations to get this year, more needles, I can hardly wait. This week Patty finally had her follow up appointment with Dr. Walsh at the Cleveland Clinic. We got a few answers and a lot more questions, he added another medicine to Patty's regime to hopefully help her existing medicines work better and smoother, she is still struggling with some side effects from a couple of medications that are giving her some fits, we hope to get them worked out soon. Life for Patty is like the old days of the Cracker Jacks boxed candies - when they had a lot of different prizes available - she never knows what the day will bring until she wakes up each morning. She has some interesting days, especially when her blood pressure stays very low for most of the day. Until next time, we wish everyone well, we hope that all is well with you and your family and friends.