Day +12 - Are We Engrafting?

 Each day in the hospital passes slowly, tortoise-like in that you barely notice the day moving, but time passes quickly. It's hard to believe I've been here for 19 days. 

Starting on Day +5, I've been getting a shot of Granix which is aimed at boosting cell production, which has been decimated from the four days of chemo/conditioning I received before the stem cell infusion. Yesterday, after a good frozen food dinner, courtesy of my caregiver, chauffeur, and loving wife, and  my sixth shot of Granix, I started feeling markedly better in the evening. And it's got me wondering if I've turned the corner and my counts will start showing growth. If not, and this is how I feel with depleted counts, then that's good, too.

We'll find out soon enough when the morning labs come in...

A bag of platelets
being infused.

And the results are in. No, not engrafting yet. But in all honesty, I kind of knew they wouldn't be climbing yet. Dr. Soiffer and others thought it would be around day 14-16 when they start climbing so I'm still a couple days away from realistically hoping for a climb.  White blood cells dropped from 0.04 to 0.03 yesterday morning, and 0.02 today. My platelets also fell below the 10,000 mark to 6,000 meaning I'm getting an infusion of donated platelets as I write this. As I said in an earlier post, platelets have a very short shelf life, creating an ongoing need for fresh donations. If you ever thought about donating blood or platelets, know that they are always needed.  

There's a pun in here somewhere about time passing quickly, hare- like, and me losing my hair, but I can't find it. So will just share that  for the second time in the last six months, my hair be gone.

It started falling out in earnest two nights ago, so yesterday, my nurse Yasmine, the giver of my new stem cells, became barber Yasmine, taker of my hair. It'll grow back in a few months time, but for now sporting the buzz look and I might keep the look even when I have other hair options.