Friday May 8th- Its been a busy week

Well, the weekend is finally here. It is 507p and I am sitting in our lunch room writing this blog, Jamie is catching an afternoon ciesta, one which she very much deserves, we have been running crazy this week. It is run, then sit for 2 hours, run, then sit for 2 hours. It gets to be very exhausting. We have had appointments everyday this week. Monday thru Wednesday we had appointments for the Stem Cell collection, Thursday we had three appointments starting at 11am which we left the Hope Lodge at 945a for and we didn't return last night til 730p. Today we left the Hope Lodge by 7am and we didn't return until 130p after my blood transfusion today. We are learning that although Sloan-Kettering may be one of the best about administering cancer treatment, they sure do take their time giving the treatment. It seems that they always run behind and even if you make an effort to get to an appointment early it never seems to matter. For instance, we were done with our 3pm CT Scan by 2pm yesterday, because we got there early and were taken early, our next appointment wasn't until 430p to see my oncologist, we got there around 230p hoping to get seen early. Instead we waited to be taken at our appointment time of 430p and proceeded to wait an additional hour and 15 minutes in the actual room to be seen.

Today our appointment was for 8am, we were the first ones there at 745a. They had to draw blood to cross and type it to get a match for the transfusion, (why this wasn't done yesterday when the drew my labs....I have no idea). They said that it would take an hour to hour and a half. Two and a half hours later we got into the infusion room for the transfusion.

We are seeing why they ask people to be here to receive this treatment, it is like a full time job. I had to get the transfusion today because my hemoglobin number was at 7.8 and they would like to see it above 8. Getting a blood transfusion helps me avoid getting out of breath when climbing stairs and getting headaches from time to time. From what I understand hemoglobin (aka Red Blood Cells) are what carry oxygen to the different parts of the body, thus when you are not getting enough oxygen it is why a person gets out of breath or gets a headache. On a good note my HCG number which had been as high as 360 was at 20 yesterday. This the doctor said was the best news he had gotten all day yesterday. A normal person's HCG or someone in remission is somewhere between 4 and 5 so mine is definitely headed in the right direction.

We don't have any plans yet for the weekend, it will all depend upon how I feel and what the weather is like.

TGIF!