BoUnCe

If anyone ever get's a blood or marrow transplant, let me tell ya now - it's 6-7 days after the transplant that the chemo will get ya'.

His numbers are up and so is he, so to speak. (we are at +11)

We just got back to the hotel after Gil's 5 day stay in at Moffitt. Energy is real low, hair is falling out, and his digestive issues are getting under control.

But his blood is reproducing as expected:
White BC hit a low of .05k to, now, .99k (normal range 4.0-10.9)
Hemoglobin is up and down, low of 10, highest was 11, down today to 9.4 (range is 13.4 - 16.9)
Platelets keep fluctuating lowest was .7, currently at 18...below 10 he gets an infusion (he's had 2 so far - day +6 & day +9).
Neutrophils are up to .55k from nothing (range 1.8-7.8), I guess these are important buggers for the immune system 'cause that is the one they watch to let us know when he can resume normal activities...and to what extent.

Now, the other night my mom asked me a tricky question: How do we know if this all worked?

Are you asking was the transplant successful?  His blood is reproducing, for the most part, so I would say the transplant was a success. Very high success rate with Auto transplant anyways because it's all your own cells.

In the way of curing his cancer? They wanted him in total remission before they started, so technically cancer free as of the beginning of this transplant process. So it really didn't cure the cancer itself, but should prevent him from ever having Hodgkin's again. There is a possibility of another form of cancer somewhere down the line - but only as much as the next person.

So WAS it a success? I guess we'll only know if he never has Hodgkin's again!

All I know is I hope he continues to bounce back. It should be about 3 months before life returns to normal - about a year for complete recovery. For now, we are still in Tampa till June 6th at the earliest, June 13th at the latest.