March 10, 2003
Wanted to share the latest update with you.
Hard to believe it's been 3 years! (For those of you who might be wondering, it's day 1,096.) Dave had his 3-year check-up at Dana Farber today. Yesterday was officially the anniversary of his transplant. No major news to report. He's doing fine, still in remission, all counts look good. The doctor has decided to reduce his Gleevec to 300 mg a day, down from 400 mg. Because Dave is at the leading edge of the research on Gleevec post-transplant, the doctor doesn't have any information to call on when deciding whether to stop the Gleevec completely or reduce the dose. He has more information on patients who haven't had transplants, but the data doesn't really apply. Sooo, Dave is a bit of a guinea pig. We'll go back in 4 months and the doctor will check to make sure nothing has changed.
Also today, our nurse Mildred brought us back to 6A -- the pod at Brigham & Women's where Dave's room was during his transplant. I'd been back, but this was Dave's first visit. He was pretty nervous, but he did fine. He wasn't sure how he'd feel -- after all, he was there for a pretty unpleasant experience -- but fortunately, he really only remembered taking walks back and forth in the little "safe area" outside his room. His primary nurse Jean was there. She didn't remember Dave, but she remembered me. Dave looked a little different then. There was also a researcher there, Dr. Chang, who Dave has spoken with a number of times since his transplant. They were both thrilled to see him -- they don't often get to see patients after they're better, so it was nice to be able to go and say thank you, and let them see a success story.
On a more philosophical note, Dave and I were talking about how our lives have been changed by the whole experience (as have many of yours). It was during the course of treatment that we met many new and wonderful friends -- some of you going through difficult times yourselves. We learned that when the going got tough, our families were behind us all the way, offering support and doing whatever they could, each in their own way, to help us through our darkest hours. And we learned that within ourselves we have the strength to face whatever may come our way (although we sure hope there's no more bad stuff headed our way!!). In case we havenšt said it often enough, thank you!
Allison