Wednesday, March 18, 2015

How not to start your day

How would you like to start your day?

(a) With a smile
(b) With a gulp of something awful, then a grimace and a groan.

You probably answered (a). I would chose that too, and on special occasions I do, forgoing (b), which is caused by mixing 5 tablets of Exjade in water, doing the gulp thing, and then, to do it right and thereby prolong the distasteful task, adding more water to absorb the little leftover pieces and drinking some more.

Then, wait 30 minutes while it does its work of removing excess iron from the body through a process called chelating in which it attaches to the iron and carries it out.

During which time, drink coffee (the wonder drug!) to mask the nausea.

I bring this up because although I no longer report my counts, which thankfully is very yesterday since most everything is where it is supposed to be, I noticed at my appointment Thursday that my ferritin had gone up, while the point of this battle is to make it go down.

It was 1832 (normal is 10-170) compared to about 1400 three months ago.

Melissa said that by taking the Exjade and getting a therapeutic phlebotomy every two months, I am doing all the right things. The number is influenced by other factors, such as graft vs. host disease, and we don't want to do any more for that because it would mean taking more prednisone.

All is well, though.

The timer just went off and I can eat my toast.

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