Right on Track

Things are progressing fast and today was a whirlwind of appointments. After having lab draw at 9:30, the next stop was to the clinic nurse for administration of 3 Neupogen (growth factor) injections. We then met with the nutritionist where we got an A+!!! Nothing like being graded on what I fix for Dave's dinner! I then went to a class on food preparation and safety while Dave went to the hotel for a break and to spend a little time with Ripley. He met up with me at 1:00 for a "Managing Care at Home" class, which was 2 hrs. of mind-boggling information. It's a good thing they gave handouts, or we would really be in rough shape! Then onto Dave's last appointment of the day, which was a pulmonary function test, he did well with that also. I did have a surprise waiting for Dave when he was through, as I managed to get him a free ticket to the Mariner's game tonight from the cancer center. Wow - was he ever happy about that! The SCCA occasionally gets free "suite" tickets so that immunosuppressed patients may attend a Mariner's game and not be in the huge crowd. Dave was able to go with a wonderful couple we met who are from Spokane. I elected to stay home with Ripley as he had been alone for most of the day. That's where Dave is right now and I know he is enjoying every minute of it. It's nice to have a little normalcy. Tomorrow is a HUGE DAY and a step in the right direction - they will start to harvest his stem cells. This procedure is called apheresis and takes approximately 3 hours. It may take several days of apheresis to collect enough stem cells (5 million) for the transplant. He will continue daily blood draws and growth factor shots during this phase.