Joe and I drove up to Durham on Thursday and had his appointment on Friday. They are looking for a few different things at this point. The cellularity (basically the population of the cells within the marrow), whether the engraftment percentage has changed, looking closely if any viruses are hiding in the marrow and if there is any new disease presence. In short the doctors don’t have any strong feeling about what is causing the drop in his numbers. However, they both (his doctor and his PA) said that they would be really surprised if disease was causing the drop since he had a clean marrow sample just a month ago. Despite that we are feeling extremely anxious. We should know the preliminary results mid week and will have another appointment at duke on the 5th to review the full report and get some sort of game plan.
I can’t speak for Joe, but for me, it is very hard to not go to a place of anger. We were just settling in and getting beautiful moments of “normal”. The thought that we are so quickly taking a step back is very hard for me. I really thought that we would be able to relax for awhile after the last marrow results. It feels like we got done with a long hike and someone took our pack and let us sit down. Then immediately turned around with a bigger, heavier pack and gave us a kick in the rear to get back on the trail.
We don’t know where the new path to healing will lead us; maybe it won’t be much different than the path we were already on. Either way, I am tired of the unknown. Please be praying for all of us in this. It’s hard to be going back and forth (both physically and emotionally) so much. We were all hoping for more stability and “whole family” time as Arleigh says. We really cherish all the thoughts and prayers you all send to carry us through this season. Thank you doesn’t cover it.