Tuesday, November 20, 2007

Day 100 Workup

Today I spent most of the day at the BMT clinic getting the first bit of the 100 day workup. It included quite a few vials of blood (no worries, I still have my line in, so no pain from that), a pulminary function test (PFT) where I blew into a tube measuring my lung capacity and dispersion, and finally a bone marrow aspiration where they drew out some bone marrow. They typically take a bone core biospy, but for some reason they didn't need one, so that made it much easier. They are really good at the clinic and provide plenty of pain medication, so I didn't feel a whole lot. I also did well on the pulminary function test, scoring just about the same as I did before the transplant, though my reaction times were a bit slowed, since they did the bone marrow before the PFT, so I was a little spacey from the morphine. I also came home and slept for like 4 hours, and don't expect to be able to stay up very much longer! But I think this is the only day that would be painful, my other appointments are the eye doctor, dermatologist, and OB. I'll find out the results of all these test the Thursday after thanksgiving. Keep your fingers crossed that everything comes out ok, and that I can start tapering off my drugs!

Back to School!!

I spent my first day at school yesterday (Monday)! It was great, though my new office isn't quite ready, it was fantastic to see everyone. Though it is a bit strange now that Miriah has moved to Boston, but eventually we all have to move on! My day was pretty low-key. I first went in search of my new office, which should be ready by Wednesday. Then found Roni, and we "conferenced" until lunch time, where we conferenced some more over indian food. I then went to Sarah Geneser's Defense, which is of course inspiring me to get done! (Congrats Sarah!!). Then I went back home. I'll be going back on Wednesday to not only claim my office, but also see dear old friends Bruce and Amy Gooch!

Day 100

Well, I made it! Saturday the 17th was day 100, which is our arbitrary milestone, so now they are going to start with the work-up to see how well the transplant went (i.e. how much of my blood is mine vs the donor), if I still have any AML cells, as well as see if there is damage from the radiation and chemo. So, lots of tests, but nothing too terrible. So what did I do to celebrate day 100? Well, my parents stayed the night at their apartment, so I stayed all by myself all night long for the first time in a really really long time. It was very nice, though all I did was grab some takeout and watch SNL. But like I said, it was nice and felt like "normal", that is, like before all of this started, which is very cool.

Thursday, November 1, 2007

Last Day of Vis

Well, it's been really great. My talk went really well, and I got some great feedback. While I missed a lot of talks, opting instead to hang out in my room and stay away from sick people, I have really gotten alot out of the conference. I'd like to say Hi to all my new friends who have been following the blog, but I've never met before, and say thanks to everyone following my health! I feel fantastic and am really motivated to get some work done towards gettin' graduated!