Day +9

Hello everyone, Emily here.  Thought I would update you on how my Dad is doing. 

He is now Day +9 or 9 days from his transplant day.  His white blood cell count or absolute neutrophil count has hit rock bottom,  as in 0.  He has no white cells or no way of fighting infection right now.  This is his most vulnerable time and the goal is to keep him from getting any infections which could make him quite sick.  A couple of days ago he had a low grade fever and had blood cultures drawn but so far they don't show any sign of any bacteria growing.  He is on some good antibiotics and is being watched closely for any signs of impending infection.

These last few days have not been easy on my Dad.  Being a bone marrow transplant nurse who takes care of children I see and deal with transplant patients all of the time.  It is not easy to watch little people go through transplant but I would say that it has been much harder watching my own Dad go through it.  Much harder than I realized it would be.  He has been suffering with fatigue, nausea, diarrhea, loss of appetite and just in general feels like crappola.  On a  happy note, he has had no mouth sores!  Maybe all of the ice he so faithfully chewed as the chemo was infusing paid off!   In the last couple of days he has received two platelet tranfusions and two red blood cell transfusions.  Along with his white blood count dropping his platelets and red cells have taken a dive which is to be expected.  So he will continue to get transfusions to keep those cells up. 

Now we just wait and get my Dad through this really rough period.  Soon, hopefully in the next week we should see some white cells starting to appear which would mean the stem cells that he received are taking hold or engrafting.  Things start to look better once this happens and hopefully he will regain his appetite and the nausea will subside. 

Through all of this I have been so impressed by my Dad.  He does not complain!  He is a silent sufferer and I admire and love him so much!  He has been getting many medications to help with the nausea as well as his regular meds that help him with sleep and neuropathy pain, so he is sleepy a lot of the time.  He still pushes through each day and faithfully walks or bikes, does his mouth care four times a day (which is super important for transplant patients) and keeps up on current events as he reads the Trib each day.  My Mom has moments of feeling very overwhelmed and worried but each day is by my Dad's side to care for him, comfort him and love him.  She is so good. 

Thank you to all of you, brothers, sisters, cousins, Grandma Cain, nieces and nephews, friends and neighbors for caring and praying for my Dad.  We feel your prayers and your love.  It really means so much when you mention that you are praying for him or placing his name on prayer rolls in the Temple.. Thank you, thank you. We know that Heavenly Father is aware and loves my Dad and is blessing him. 

We have such hope that this transplant will do all that is possible to bring recovery from the Myeloma.  We will keep you posted. 

Loves.  

ps.. I added some pictures and video of his transplant day below.