Wednesday March 9

Good morning. Watching the today show and actually getting into the cooking session - good sign!  My Mom arrived on yesterday Tuesday March 8th and will be here until the 15th.  My friend Ellen brought her to Beth Israel then home to North Andover.

Today (Wednesday) Jim is traveling so Emma and my Mom are spending the day together.  Also had a lovely morning visit from my cousin Margein today (Wednesday).

Emma is working on the crew for the play and Joe comes home for Spring break later this week (probably Friday).  He'll be home through Easter so a nice long break.  Fun stuff on the horizon

Medical Update:  Seem to be tolerating the infusion chemo pretty well so far.  This is the 3 cocktail chemo I've been taken over 3 hours for the last 5 days.  Yesterday (tuesday) was my also my last day of infusion chemo.  No final word on when I'll go home from this stay.  At least a few days.  Sometimes the bad side effects kick in a few days after the  chemo is done so keep your fingers crossed.  We will likely start on a pill chemo tomorrow or the next day, see how I do and then send me home on the pill.  Still working on the timing on this and will be determined by side effects.

Next up is most likely some type of cell infusion again from my original donor.  It would either be a DLI (donor lymphocyte infusion) or Boost (stem cell transplant but outpatient).  Determining factors will be level of engraphment of my donor cells in both my marrow and blood stream.  They are doing a chrimerism today to see where I am with donor cells in my blood stream.  I imagine a bone marrow may be in my near future but timing remains to be seen.

So I got through the infusion chemo with minimal side effects so far. waiting on starting a pill chemo and then giving it another few days in the hospital to see if there are any side effects that will keep me here or if I can head home (dare I say as early as next week??)