My labs came back this morning and there’s enough stem cells in my peripheral blood to start harvesting, so a’ harvestin’ we shall go.
Sorry, I got a whole 3 hours of sleep last night between the lower back pain from the Neupogen and having the catheter lines and dressing on my neck.
Wish me luck … I’m scheduled for four days of this but as soon as I have enough cells they get rid of the catheter and the shots so hopefully I get to sleep again.
Update: turns out I forgot to post this. It’s 2:30 pm, and I’m feeling good, actually. Just been kicking back all day in a hospital bed while the machine runs, and my nurse, Heather, is awesome. She even got me a Starbucks! I’m going to go above and beyond and do a few more hours on the machine than the requisite 5 in the hopes of getting done quicker — the minute we get all the cells needed for two transplants I can get this goddamn catheter out of my neck and stop with the Neupogen shots.
Machine behind me there is the apheresis machine that pulls my blood out, separates out the stem cells, and then puts the blood back in. You can’t really see it but I have two lines running into my neck on the far side that connect to the machine.
And ... Cancer. 