A Marrow Margin of Error

I couldn't include Kathy in the picture because it would be a Hippo violation

As usual, I’m way too pooped to write very much, but want to keep everyone in the loop.

All in all, today (Thursday) was a good day for Kathy, although “good” is a lot more complicated than it used to be a few weeks ago. Most importantly, her bone marrow biopsy results came in and were good. Maybe they were great. Conceivably almost perfect. 

I’m vague because it’s damn near impossible to get straight information out of the doctors. So here’s the deal: what we ideally want is all of the cancer cells in the blood and marrow to be 100% wiped out, after which Kathy will receive a drug which will get her body building white cells and bone marrow again - only healthy (we hope). But Kathy’s result showed that she still had 0.1% cancer cells. Almost none, but not quite none. 

Which is where the doctor had to make an “educated guess” based on his expertise and experience. That 0.1% might represent cancer cells that are still in the process of dying…so maybe she DID get ‘em all (or is about to). The problem is that if too many are still viable, the same drug that gets everything cranked up to high speed again will also stimulate the growth of those cancerous cells. 

But the other option is another round of tough chemo, and that’s not a fight anyone walks away from unscathed. Those toxic chemicals are designed to do damage and they're good at their job. Kathy is doing well, but she’s fighting fevers (which can be quite dangerous) and has a variety of other challenging and risky side effects which are all being handled, but which we certainly don’t want to make worse. So the doctor, taking all of this into consideration and without ever using the “remission” word (although that might just be an oversight), has decided to move ahead as if Kathy is in remission and see where it goes from there.

So this was probably really good news, but it’s unsettling too - like having a front-row seat to watch a guy juggling nitro-glycerine.

Outside of sleeplessness, an uncomfortable skin condition (chemo effect), a continuing barrage of fevers (treated with Tylenol and ice bags), endless IV bags of blood and platelets, etc, Kathy is doing well and keeping her mood up. She exercises daily (confined to a chair for the time being), is doing a great job of eating, and our conversations are very normal and punctuated with laughter…when we can think of things to talk about. It turns out that the only thing in our heads is hospital stuff, and that’s what we DON’T want to talk about. Oh, we occasionally drop four-letter commentary on the current state of affairs, but our hearts aren't in it.

Daughter J and I regroup each evening to take comfort in each other’s company (I'm the only visitor allowed) and look forward to getting Kathy home where she belongs. And hopefully that will happen soon, but right now we’re very much taking things a day at a time. Which, believe me, is all we can handle.

As always, thanks to all of you for the amazing display of support, good wishes, and prayers. They all make a difference. We never really knew how many of you were family until now.

-Stilton