T + 13


Uneventful night medically. The stress of our situations continue though. My blood counts continue to improve. My butt end is close to normal now. Time since chemo and having my white cells back is helping that significantly. I’ve added a new opportunistic condition when my counts were down, jock itch, lovely. Got some powder & creams for that today. My mouth is mostly back to normal with a few residual sores. I can tell that my condition is dehydrating me if I don’t stay on top of it. Mexican take out for me tonight. My parents are in town.

My mother will donate platelets tomorrow at Atlanta Blood Services in the Tower at Northside Hospital across the hall from BMTG. Thanks ahead of time to all of Marie Wilson’s co-workers and compadres that have signed up to donate also. Karin turned in your contact info today and they should be contacting you soon. Thankfully I only needed 2 units of whole blood and 2 units of platelets. I do not think that I will need any more. Most of the other patients need many many units for long periods of time. There are new signs posted in the clinic this week that there is a current shortage of platelets. If any of you in the Atlanta are interested in donating platelets (it takes just over 2 hours, they can do all of the pre-approval questioning over the phone or e-mail ahead of time, so that you don’t travel to ABS, they are open Mon-Sat), send me an e-mail (markbest5@hotmail.com) and I will compile your info and pass it to Atlanta Blood Services. To all of you everwhere that can, donate and/or continue to donate blood or platelets at your local blood centers. Cancer patients need lots of it. I donated over 100 pints of whole blood to the American Red Cross before I became a reject in January with my diagnosis.

Keeping strong,

Mark