Monday April 4th 100 day review at BMT Clinic

IHOP for my birthday

Lovely dinner by Kristy and first glass of wine that has tasted great for a long time.

a perfect moment

Getting more stem cells...and it hurt!

Interesting day but not for the reasons I was hoping. So my review says my myeloma is in remission and we're on track. This is where the conversation should have ended and Kristy and I should have skipped out of there to a small celebration of some kind, sadly not the case. As we know my bone marrow is suppressed and I've been getting blood products and neupogen shots to keep me going. Well last week one of my doctors thought my lymphocyte count was high and that pointed to a particular problem with a particular fix. After talking to another of my doctors he said the opposite, that the lymphocyte count was low....which is a little concerning. This is the first time in my treatment this has happened so I can forgive the error and move on. I did have my heart set on the easy fix that I was led to believe could be the case if the lymphocyte count was high but hey ho!
So my doctors are back to not knowing why at about 100 days post transplant my bone marrow stopped working.
To add a little insult to injury, the last 3 or 4 visits I've had to the clinic I have mentioned gum/tooth pain with swollen lymph glands. This was pretty much passed over until today's (Monday's) visit. My face/jaw is now quite swollen on one side  and I have an abscess. This happened I'm told because my wbc is still low (0.6), so I'm open to all kinds of infection with no defense. So they started me on IV antibiotics and decided I should get another stem cell transplant/boost...now! The stem cells are the next attempt to raise my counts and kick start my bone marrow so that I don't have to be kept going via transfusions. The stem cells don't start to grow (engraft) for about 10 days so my doctor wanted to start immediately to minimize the time I'm open to infection. Sadly they haven't had someones counts drop at this point before so we are in uncharted territory. There is no guarantee the cells will work and if they don't there is a plan B and maybe a plan C, which start to get a bit unsavory around C so fingers crossed for plan A!
So, in goes a huge needle "this is going to hurt" - thanks Kristy! I guess stem cells are relatively large little buggers...and off to the hospital to nab the last room on unit 41, yes my old friend where I spent 12 days in December, where I felt the sickest I have ever. They even had me in the room next to my old one - I'd like to think it was for old times sake, but I was told it was actually the only open room. However it was nice to see the nurses who helped me through those days, it is a cool unit. Last time I had a transplant I had a central line which dumped any drugs or cells into my jugular vein near my heart. I didn't feel any sensation when they slowly infused 4x50ml syringes of ice cold cells. Well I felt it today! It was same as a brain freeze in my arm for about 30-40 minutes! Not a lot of fun, the problem is if the cells warm up the preservative they are in becomes toxic. They also gave me 50ml of benadryl IV before the cells which confined me to a laying position as I had no sense of balance.
So our 'good news I'm in remission day' ended up not as fun as I would have hoped. It also took a lot longer than anticipated - thank you Kathy for looking after our kids all day! 
I know I've said it before but I don't think I can say it enough, thank you family and friends for your help and support. This is a very difficult process made easier on me, Kristy, Sophie and James because of you.
Good news, okay creatinine is 2.1 and all my GI, food and drink issues seem to have dissappeared over the last week or so. Coffee, wine, beer and food is pretty much back to normal and I get hungry and thirsty again - which is nice. I'll be going to clinic everyday for a while to keep an eye on things and for daily neupogen shots. So I'll update if anything interesting happens.