Grandma Update

I know, it's been a while since my last post. I had to have a serious talk with my momma about helping me more. We'll see if it did any good. I apologize ahead of time but this will be a long wordy post and may be TMI for some of you.

Puddles posted some good news about my grandma and her girl earlier this week and I want to say

Thank You, Puddles!

Now we have even more support than we had before.

The good news about grandma is that one of her brothers is a match for the transplant!!!! We found out yesterday that one of her sisters is a match as well!! There is about a 25% chance of having a sibling be a match so we are fortunate to have 2 matches.

This whole thing has been a bit overwhelming, as you can imagine. For those of you who are new and don't know, Grandma has to have this transplant because she has CMML, an uncommon form of Leukemia. She got this type of Leukemia because of the chemotherapy she had to have last year to treat ovarian cancer.  The only chance of living a long life after being diagnosed with CMML is to have an

allogeneic bone marrow transplant. Other treatments may slow the progression of the disease but they can't stop it and without the transplant life expectancy is about 2-5 years. So, there was no question as to whether or not she wanted to proceed with this.

This type of transplant has about a 50% success rate and the way we understand it, that is a very good number in the world of transplants. The biggest risk factors are GVHD (Graft vs. Host Disease) and illness. Grandma will basically have no immune system for at least 100 days after the transplant. They have to be very careful to keep germs away from her.

For example, if Momma were to peel a banana for her it would go like this:

1. Wash hands

2. Wash banana for at least 2 minutes

3. Peel banana 

4. Wash hands

5. Grandma gets banana without ever touching the peel

For those first 100 days, she will only be able to go to the doctors office and home with no visitors, only her caregiver.

Crazy, huh?

We keep reminding ourselves it will all be worth it and most of these changes will be short term.

Grandma's transplant is scheduled for Monday, Feb 7th. The stem cells will be "harvested" from my uncle that morning and she will receive them that afternoon. She will undergo chemotherapy for 3 days prior to that to suppress her immune system and blood counts.

On top of all of this, Grandma and Grandpa had to put their 2 kitties up for adoption this week. Even though I am not a big fan of cats, I am sad that they had to give them up.

 Thank You!

 Thank You!

 Thank You!

 for all your crossed paws, healing vibes, good wishes and prayers. We appreciate them more than you will ever know.