U of C Day 1 - Getting Settled

It's been a really long day. We had to leave the house around 6am to attempt to make it to the hospital by 7:30 this morning. Of course, traffic was not in our favor today and we didn't arrive until after 8am. They started the stem cell collection process immediately on his mom and it went for about 5 hours. She did well, just exhausted after the process was done. As expected, she needs to report in tomorrow again for a second collection as they were not able to collect enough cells in this one shot. She is at home now resting and will be back in the hospital tomorrow morning to do it all again. Leo spent his whole morning getting platelet transfusions, 3 units to be exact. By the time they got to the third unit, he started to break out in hives and his lips got swollen, but the nurses said it was not uncommon given that he had so many platelet units at once. They gave him some Benadryl and Cortizone and he was feeling better. After the platelet buffet, they took Leo to have his Hickman Line put in. That is basically tubes that come out of his collarbone area that will be used to administer medicine, draw blood and do the transplant. The procedure took about an hour and he is now recovering from that. They gave him some serious drugs, so he's pretty knocked out. The doctors said that it will be a bit painful after the drugs wear off, but should only last a couple days. After that procedure, they finally admitted him into his room. Just our luck, the floor is quite full, so we have the world's smallest room. All that can fit in here is the hospital bed and a chair. I've already asked if this is where he's going to be for the duration of his stay and they said they would try to get him a bigger room.

Since I had a lot of waiting time today, I decided to donate platelets. Leo has clearly done his part to deplete this supply, getting several transfusions a week. I had no idea that there was such a need for platelet donors. But I guess you can only use the platelets up to 5 days after they are donated, so that really limits everything. The process take about an hour and a half, so much more involved than donating blood. But you can donate platelets every 72 hours. Given that, I will be visiting the donation group every 3 days while we are here. It's nice because I can donate specifically for Leo (and he will be needing transfusions over the next week) and I get a consolation prize of free parking. So I'll take it. If anyone else is in the area and can spare some time, please consider donating platelets as well. You can donate specifically for Leo or just for anyone else in need - it's a great gift to give!

A change to Leo's treatment that we were informed of today is that they will no longer do the Total Body Radiation that they were planning to do. Instead, they will administer Chemotherapy starting tomorrow. This decision was based largely on the his hospitalization this past weekend. We have been told that the end result should be the same (basically zapping all his bone marrow so they can transplant the new marrow).

Because several people have asked again, Leo is allowed to have visitors for now. Absolutely no kids under 16. Even if he wants to see our kids, he cannot do it on the unit, he would have to walk out to the reception area and do it from there. No flowers or food (especially fresh fruits) will be allowed on to the unit, much less his room. As I said, we are currently in the world's smallest room, so it won't be a "comfortable" visit and you will likely not have anywhere to sit. And obviously, if you have ANY sort of sickness, cough, cold, flu...whatever. Please do not come here. Thanks!

Ok-that's all I have for today. It's only 7:30pm and I am exhausted. I can only imagine how Leo must be feeling. Have a wonderful evening everyone and please keep Leo in your prayers.