Rest of the Photos Posted

Silly me, I forgot the transplant photos! Here they are -- also linked below.

Photo Links Added

Check out the links to the left showing some pictures from Kristina's life and various stages of the treatment. From the Himalayas to shopping for wigs!

Looking for an Update?

If you're wondering how Kristina is doing, here's a suggestion: give her a call!

I might sound like I'm being sarcastic, but think about it: if you were sick, couldn't work, and had to limit your social interactions, you'd probably want to hear from people, right? That's why I called her the other night.

I can tell you this: there's still some medical stuff going on, most of it in her intestines, and some of it is quite unpleasant. There are still concerns about larger issues, and now the possibility of more IV fluids and meds being given. She should be hearing more about that this week.

For more, I really encourage you to get in touch. If you need her number, email me. And speaking of email, she only checks that about once a week, so the phone really is better.

Thanks for checking in! She really appreciates it.

Paul
paul@paulgerald.com

Past Day 180!

I spent 45 minutes on the phone with Kristina tonight, and she sounds pretty darn good. She is excited to have passed Day 180 since the transplant -- amazing, isn't it? -- and she tells me she has an inch and a half of hair now! It's dark brown, and she's having sort of an identity crisis, but as she says, at least she's buying clothes now!

I was sitting on the porch when she called, not taking notes or typing, just watching the bats fly around and enjoying the breeze ... so I forgot a lot of stuff I'm supposed to be saying. And she forgot some stuff she had wanted to tell me. So there are your disclaimers.

One thing she did recently was help a group called The Madhouse Project raise $134,000 for the Seattle Cancer Care Alliance. The Madhouse Project is a group of successful 30something guys in Seattle (they named it for their old college crash pad) who get together once a year to raise money to fight cancer. They have a silent auction and a regular auction, and this year Kristina was asked to speak. She told me she screwed it up royally, but she also said there were a lot of tears, and hey, they raised $134,000! Something must have gone right.

She's been doing some physical therapy with other cancer survivors: walking, yoga, this sort of thing. The main thing is to try to rebuild muscle mass after all the lying around and taking drugs. She still has some GI hassles (bad abdominal pain and needing to stay close to a bathroom) on occasion, and there are still hassles with the insurance company, and of course there's always money concerns ...

But let's not forget that she is alive and cancer-free, 180 days after a transplant. That's amazing and more than wonderful. She's really grateful folks are staying in touch -- and if you aren't, well, you ought to be. Give her a call, for heaven's sake!

Update for April 8

Hello, folks! So sorry I failed to post an update after telling you that Kristina was going in for an endoscopy.


So the word from that procedure was that she does not have GVH in her digestive system, which is great news. She is still dealing with some fatigue and lack of appetite, but she is scheduled to have her lines pulled (that's the hookup for the old IV input) day after tomorrow.


She got a reminder recently of her fragile state: she was invited to a small afternoon barbecue and found out, at the very last minute, that somebody was bringing a child who had recently been given a live vaccine, which is something Kristina cannot be around. So at the very last minute she found out she couldn't go. This kind of thing is really tough for her, as you can imagine.


Otherwise, she still has to fight with the insurance world on many occasions. She fell through some kind of crack in the bureaucracy and has been getting a lot of bills she shouldn't be getting, and this may be starting to affect her credit rating. She is also trying to look over her mother, who now lives in Seattle.


She continues to express how grateful and amazed she is for all the support she's getting, and she continues to request all those healing vibes be sent her way. A few financial donations (just in time to write them off before April 15!) wouldn't hurt, either!


We're working on getting some more photos on here, and I'm trying to get a video someone shot at the Bone Marrow Bash fundraiser posted on YouTube. So stay tuned.


Otherwise, take a moment on Saturday to contemplate this: that day is Day #150 since the transplant! Amazing how time flies.


Thanks for checking in.
Paul

Back to the Doctor

Hi, folks!

Happy spring to you all, and thanks for checking in here. Kristina really appreciates it and loves hearing from folks (hint, hint).

So her recent troubles with a loss of appetite -- and therefore an overall loss of weight and energy -- have continued to the point that she's scheduled to see a doctor on Monday the 24th. They're going to do an endoscopic procedure, which basically means sticking a camera down her throat to see what's up. She has to get knocked out for this to happen.

What she's hoping they won't find is Graft Versus Host Disease, which is a fairly common reaction to a transplant. What GVH amounts to is the immune system of the transplanted cells attacking her body, thinking it's an invader. A backwards distortion of a healthy system, and one than can cause a lot of problems.

If her current troubles are GVH, then it's back onto the steroids, which she would not be happy about. Steroids (specifically prednizone) make her anxious, mess with her vision, make her urinate a lot more than usual, and make her gain weight. Not fun.

So what we're hoping is that she's just dealing with some stress (the insurance problem is still around) rather than something chronic that will require medication. So it's positive-vibe time again!

Meanwhile, she's only seeing her doctor once a week, in addition to a support group for post-transplant patients, so in that sense she is progressing. She just needs to get this ... whatever it is ... straightened out so she can get back to eating and move towards a more normal life.

Thanks again for checking in, and for gosh sakes, give her a call!

Little Appetite, Low energy

Considering what Kristina was dealing with a while back, not having an appetite and therefore being kind of tired all the time doesn't seem that bad. In that sense, the news is good.

But not eating and not having energy is kind of a problem -- especially when last week she went through a spell of diarrhea that caused her to lose six pounds in nine days.

In other news, the confusion over the insurance seems to have been settled -- a huge relief -- but the question of how to pay the latest bill remains. Money is an eternal issue in her life, it seems.

Medically, her magnesium levels are back on the rise, and her doctor thinks she might "get her line pulled" within the next couple of weeks. That means removing the thing they put in her chest to accept the IV drip. She'd love to get that removed and not have to do the IV thing anymore!

For a little more information about the stage she's in -- past Day 100 -- check out this page from the National Marrow Donor Program.

And that seems to be it for now. Thanks for checking in. She and I talked about maybe trying to post something every week, even if there isn't much to say. We'll try to do that.