You know it seems like forever since my diagnosis last March, but now that a large part {I can't say portion because I now begin a 3 year chemo/maintenance program} of the initial treatment is over and I look back it seems as if he time went by soooooo quickly.
Tomorrow at this time I hope to be tossing my last bag of "stuff" in Doug's vehicle and headed home!
I can't wait!
I unofficially tallied up my days I've slept in my own bed since June and I come up with a total of 3!!!
It is going to be soooooo good to sleep in my own bed again in my house which I may or may not recognize...there has been a plethora of people to whomst I cannot 'splain my grattitude to who have gone in and decluttered, sanitized, re-arranged, landscaped and brought it up to the point where I can be released to go home.
Dang all yous guys, yous just opened up the floodgate of tears again.
Simple "thank yous" just don't cut it...I wish I knew what did.
I go in this afternoon to see my Oncologist down here for "formal discharge" which should be forthcoming unless my labs,a.k.a. blood letting, which have been good all week get whacky. When I went in yesterday to have them done there was one pesky kidny function that nwas trending upward (not good) but the nurse who took my "labs" said it diddn't look "all that bad" so I'm just going to keep myself well hydrated today which seems to help and I should have to problem "passing the test".
I see him at 4:30, which means as those who have accompanied me can attest more like 5:30 - 6:00 ish which is too late for me to check out of Brent's Place...the marvelous place that I've been for the past two weeks, a.k.a. transitional housing.
It is going to be soooooooo goot to be home tomorrow.
I still have to be really careful for another month or so.
It seems that three months out from transplanct seems to be some sort of benchmark...That's when I'm supposed to be released from needing the 24/7 babysitting and can "go back to worl" and can do some traveling.
I'm gonna make one more plea to be able to go to Chicago at the end of October to attend a wedding, but the response I got late last week was, "You can talk to Dr. Lee about it, but I dont like your chances."
Before I got released to Brent's Place and once afterward I was given the, "Let's fill you up with fear speech(s) from a couple of the NPs (Nurse Practitioners) which did indeed scare the h*** out of me.
I was told, didn't need to be reminded cuz I didn't know that I have an immune system that is building itself up from almost nothing...so much so that although I'll need my puppy shots all over again I can't have those until maybe 6 months post transplant and a sure way for me to off myself would be to go and get a flu shot! Seems that I can catch something and have it quickly become mega-serious in almost no time flat which is why they want me to take my temperature twice a day and if it's over 101.5 degrees it's "don't pass go and get to the ER asap."
I was under the impression hat the primary reason I needed the 24/7 was that if I cut or bruised myself I could bleed out because of my platelet cound being so low, but as it turns out it's that I can develop and infection marked by fever soooooo quickly that I would need medical attention asap.
So, transplant August 25th, 3 months out November 25th.
You know, that's 'bout Thanksgiving and I have now and will have a lot to be thankful for, huh...
Soooooo, I need your help on something, pleeeeeeeeze.
Would you remind me, gently please, after all I'm sensitive you know, that if you see me trying to do too much, like going to the office every day or being out in public without a mask that I ain't supposed to be doing that.
I am not going to isolate and hole up at home until Thanksgiving, but I need to wear a mask when I'm out in public and that means Church, the office, AA and/or anywhere there might be germs lurking about.
I remember Dr. McFarland, my Fort Collins Oncologist telling me that, "More people die with Myeloma than of it" and thinking that to be some sort of relief, but I've come to understand that what could kill me is the "catching" of something until my immune system is back up and running that could indeed kill me.
And contrary to just a few weeks ago, I 'm not ready to check out.
That few days, although somewhat hazy, that nI really was dead {no pun intended} serious about "checking out" is still fresh in my mind.
There's one person in particular that I need to revisit those days with because a dad has no right to scare the h*** out of his son by telling him that "I'm ready and I want to die so, 'see ya'".
I'm too excited about going home that I'm not in the mood for picking up on some retro-blogging, but I'll get back to that because there's too much that I need to commit to my journal, of which this will become so that I can look back someday and say, "Wow, I really did live/go through all that."
Later.
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