Testing, testing

I was sitting here falling asleep last night while the second of two bags of blood finished. I thought I’d write an update, but I couldn’t concentrate. Today I’m trying again, slogging through a mess of typos of my own doing. My fingers and my mind seem to be suffering from a disconnect. I think it’s the meds: see below.

I’d rather be in the city that never sleeps; here in the hospital that never sleeps, I had 10 vials of blood drawn at 3 a.m. yesterday. These are for pre-transplant testing for insurance purposes. They make you jump through hoops, probably to prove you are strong enough to get through transplant. I also had an echo-cardiagram and, once my pneumonia is under control, will have to pass a series of pulmomary tests.

The verdict on the pneumonia is that it is aspergillus. So I am back on Voriconozle, my old standby. The fevers are coming down, so that’s a good sign the “Vori” is working, although once I start coughing it’s hard to stop, and my ribs are really sore. If everything continues to stabilize, I might go home early next week while we wait for a donor.

I had mentioned that I had a headache, and one of the doctors suggested an MRI “to see if your disease has spread to your brain.” Couldn’t he have found a better way to say it, such as, “We just want to make sure everything’s OK.” I thought I might avoid it because I told them the headaches were better, but this morning while I was half asleep somebody came and took me for the test. It’s loud and jarring; it sounds like someone is drilling into your head. In any case, good news on that front: There is nothing wrong with my brain.

I just came back from ultrasound testing on my legs to rule out a blood clot, because my ankles have remained pretty swollen despite taking a diuretic. The transporters taking you to these tests love to yell ahead, "BMT," "BMT" on six. (As in Bone Marrow Transplant). I'm sure it's the most efficient way to get quick service, but it also makes you feel totally self-conscious. In any case, the doctor who did the test told me the results: no blood clots.

 I’ve been taking lots of drugs – codeine for the cough, Ativan to calm me down, Demerol when I get the shakes as a fever rises, usually once a day. Also every time I turn around they are giving my IV-Benadryl, to head off reaction from platelets or some of the antibiotics I’m still on. Much of the time I’m pretty spaced out, which is fine with me.

My cousin Jeanne took the train up from New York on Tuesday. We’re nine months apart and have always been very close. For some reason when we were kids, we planned that when we grew up, we’d open a pet store in Florida together. Obviously, we didn’t. She works in the advertising business in New York and I’m a reporter in Western Massachusetts. We talked for a long time and then had “cocktail hour.” For ambiance, I turned on the electric candle that Vytas had brought me. We drank two little Cokes and toasted to a happy HEALTHY New Year.