Transplant Day!

After a couple more doses of thymoglobulin, a hit of melphalan and the beginnings of a long journey on the immunosuppressant, cyclosporine, the day has arrived where I received my donor’s stem cells. I’ve heard from a number of other shared experiences of transplantation that the actual event – the infusion of the donor stem cells into the bloodstream – is a relatively anti-climactic experience. Mine wasn’t too different in this regard, half an hour and it was all over. Yet there was still something quite surreal and special about that moment, sitting there with Nicole beside me, holding my hand, with some of our favourite music playing in the background. That flabby pink bag of cells represented our future and that short window of time was quite an emotional experience.

Later that day, I awoke from an afternoon nap to be greeted with a high temperature and chills. From then on in, it was a horrible night. Fever, chills and nausea continued until the very early hours of the morning, until I finally got some respite at around 5am. On the ward, every fever is treated as an infection until they can prove it to be otherwise, so during this time I’m given plenty of antibiotics and my blood is repeatedly tested for the presence of a pathogen. But in my case there was no infection, it was ‘simply’ my body’s reaction to the new cells. I was later told that this type of reaction doesn’t happen to everyone, but it isn’t uncommon either. I’m just glad that bit is over.

I’m not sure how quickly I will be able to put together a follow up to this post. In the next few days, the effects of the chemo will see my blood cell counts drop dramatically. Until my donor cells have had time to reconstitute my blood system, I will most likely have mouth ulcers, nausea, diarrhea, extreme tiredness, and many other nice surprises. It probably won’t be a time where I’ll feel like typing on the computer (it’s not that easy at the moment with my chemo brain).

But I will provide further updates when my condition allows.