Down With Disease

Hi Everyone!

A big thanks to everyone who dropped Kathy a birthday greeting over the weekend! She was very surprised, although I was immediately suspected as having a hand in the proceedings (probably by around 8 am). She received almost 60 emails/ecards and had a lot of fun hearing from you all. It was a big part of a restful and happy birthday weekend all around, so again, many thanks!

Hey, Monday's blood test results are in, and they're.... down!

I was definitely hoping for an upturn, specifically in hemoglobin, but it was down to 7.8 this week. Kathy's been especially watchful since the fevers a couple of weeks ago, almost to the point of over-analyzing things, but she said it seemed like I've been less energetic over the last couple of weeks. Over the weekend I did notice that I was getting a little dizzy after running up the stairs, or after the short time that I was 'allowed' to go out and clear the driveway a bit, so I wasn't entirely surprised or disappointed. However, Dr. Stan was neither surprised nor overly concerned, and commented that the chemo normally is at work for 10-14 days after infusion, and Monday would have been the 14th day. It also depends on the 'booster' shots you get every week, so that could have been a factor in the higher levels of earlier weeks.

He also informed us that the CHOP-R chemo regimen that I'm getting is fairly aggressive and will naturally wear a person down over time, which is why they rarely give anyone more than 6 rounds of it; if a cancer is particularily aggressive they might give 8. Fortunately the bone marrow test in December showed significant progress and this coming Monday will be my last treatment! Then after a couple weeks recovery I'll have one more bone marrow test to (hopefully) confirm the suppression/elimination of the WM, and then it's back to 'normal'!

I don't know how often I'll need to check in for blood tests, but the new 'normal' will include monthly B12 shots (supposedly forever) and going in for a 3-hour infusion of Rituxan every couple of months (for two years). I'm good with that, since normal will also include being able to leave the house, growing hair back (Chicago area winters are not the best time to be bald, I've found), getting back to work, and of course returning with with the Lennys for more shows!

Meanwhile, it's more of the same this week; I had to get 3 shots on Monday, and we got 5 more to take home this week. But my sense of taste seems to be completely back to normal this week, which always seems to make my appetite better, even better than when I'm taking the Prednisone which is supposed to increase it.

Anyway, here's some updated charts for you numbers geeks:

By the way, one of the things I've amused myself with over the last week or so was fixing our dryer when it conked out, so if anyone's having dryer problems, feel free to just drop it off and I'll work on it for you...

Hey, are you still voting daily at nitelife.org for the our Best of the Burbs categories? There's only about a week left until the nominations are closed, so please help us out by voting every day! Here's those categories again:

Vote for The Lennys under:

-Best Classic Rock Band

-Best Cover Band

-Best Musician - Bass (Dave Perrin)

-Best Musician - Drums (John Perrin)

-Best Musician - Guitar (Cory Devlin)

Vote for The Takeouts under:

-Best New Band

-Best Under-21 Band

-Best Local Band Original Album

-Best Local Band Original Song

Those last two are new additions to the categories- John's band The Takeouts just finished recording their first ep last weekend, and it sounds really good! They'll be having a 'release party' for it in the next couple of months, but get on the bandwagon early and vote for it now!

And let me know if any of you win one of the daily raffles that you're entered in every day that you vote! We haven't won anything yet, but I'd still like to know what the prizes are!

Thanks!