Day 52 and counting....

Pauline here again.

Boone just weighed in at 122.  I swear I don't know how he's loosing weight so fast.  It must be all the cream and butter.  My doc laughed and said that was the Atkins diet, except for all the sugar.  I had lost 7 pounds.  I guess stress burns calories.

So does trying to heal.

We are back at the clinic this Monday morning, and again Nurse Steven is like a busy bee. Working his tail off.   He's just taken a blood draw to see what the verdict is for today's meds, and please oh please can we stop the two a days!

One of the things we really have to watch for is any sort of rash.  Last night in the Infusion Room, the nurse noticed Boone's eyelid was red.  Had me take a picture to record it so the docs would be able to compare.
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The curtain fell and time passed.  Now Wednesday AM.  (Day 54)

No luck on stopping the two a day drips.  Just learned this morning that they want to see three consecutive negative tests results before stopping the antiviral drip.

Boone is doing well except the weight, and maybe we are seeing a slight bit of progress.  Tuesday he weighed in at 121; today 121.5.  We will take it.

Boone is having difficulty with the eating.  He is so weak he doesn't want to eat, but knows he has to eat.  The other night we had a come- to- Jesus meeting about he has a choice; eat or die. Period.  It's that simple.  Still it doesn't help him with the stress and anxiety of this ordeal.  I'm stressed to my limit and completly worn out, I cannot imagine how tired he is.

For those of you into the numbers, his white count last I saw was 3.8; almost in normal range.  His hemoglobin, hemoticrit, and neutrophil numbers are either low normal or just below normal.  It's only the platelets now that are being stubborn.  He's at about 25% of where he should be there, but its not particularly dangerous.  I continue to be amazed that we have seen no GVHD, or any infections.  So far, other than the three trips to the ER and one cardiac arrest, everything has gone very well.  These doctors are definitely strutting their stuff over how well he has done.  You can tell they are very pleased.

As for curing the psoriasis the hard way...I guess it is working.  The chemo works on rapidly dividing cells, which includes the skin.   Boone is now shedding large pieces of skin, more lizard like than the old small particle almost sandy looking dead skin.  In places it is falling off so fast that the new layers are tender to touch, but it appears to be nice soft normal skin underneath.  Even the blotchiness is going away.

Our issue now is he's cold and I'm constantly wanting to open the windows.  For me a top down drive in the roadster is heaven, for him impossible.  No doubt come next winter he will be having hot flashes while I freeze.