"We must free ourselves of the hope that the sea will ever rest. We must learn to sail in high winds." - Aristotle Onassis
Today was a "rest day" meaning no treatments rather than a day to rest.
Elise has an echo cardiogram and got wired up for a 24 hours Holter monitor, which is an iPod sized device that records your heart for 24 hours. This was required because the Campath she was treated with is associated with cardiac problems in some cases. So they ran these tests before and after the Campath treatment.
The person doing the echo cardiogram gave an early conclusion as he examined her heart function (which was pretty cool to watch). He said everything looked fine. I'm assuming the 24-hour monitor will say the same thing.
Other than that and and an hour with her tutor, today was pretty calm.
The pediatrics PA said her blood counts are going down as anticipated from the conditioning, but not so low that she couldn't go out in public areas. So she suggested we go out for dinner as it might be the last chance for a long time. We took her up on the offer and went to dinner where Elise could get her request: "warm chocolate melting cake". We had a good time and stuffed ourselves. It was a nice evening out.
Tomorrow is the big day: she gets the donor stem cells via an IV infusion. It's sort of a 2nd birthday.
The donor's cells have been frozen since he donated a couple weeks ago. They are preserved with something and they've told us that the preservative will have an odd odor, something like "creamed corn" they've told us. They swear it will pass, but apparently it's noticeable enough that they've warned us. Should be interesting. I probably won't be eating corn chowder in the cafeteria anytime soon.
So all is well and we are excited about tomorrow. Keep Elise in your prayers going forward as difficult times are still to come: susceptibility to infections, possible graft vs host disease, and being stuck inside four small walls for a month or longer.
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