Will you still love me to-marrow - John Mycroft and Multiple Myeloma

The old Guitar Slim song (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fj33EGMbazY) ran through my mind a few times today.  Starting with a bit of a lie-in (till nearly 7, we're not talking of lunch in bed), I left Susan to take Sam to school.  By the time she returned, I was ready to take a walk at JBL (the soccer fields).  Almost felt capable of 2 laps but settled for one and a half with an extended walk around the pavilion to stretch it a bit.  Feeling full of energy / joys of spring when I got home, I packaged up a couple of recent ebay sales and then settled down to the real task of the day - fixing the string in one of the living room cellular blinds.  (We have cordless ones in the master bathroom and, if I ever put these things in again, I will consider cordless.)  [Closer inspection reveals that they are not cordless at all but that the cords are inside the blinds and spring loaded so your chances of repairing them must be very close to zero.]  I had bodged...

Susan and I made the longish trip (2.5 hours each way) to Wake Forest today for my Day +30 check-up.  All my numbers have headed in the right direction (at least all the ones we care about) and are now firmly somewhere in the "acceptable" range.  I still don't have much stamina but it was nice to have my improvements confirmed.  (It was also nice to get back the charger for my headphones which I had accidentally left in my room though my beloved striped knitted hat appears to be a goner.  I only hope that whoever has it now wears it as much as they can and don't stuff it in a drawer and forget it.) One shock for everyone is that the school I teach at doesn't have a 100% immunisation policy.  So that means the folks at Wake Forest don't want me going back to work until at least April as a dose of measles would do me no good at all. We have a couple more dates lined up on Days +60, +90 and +100, each of which is a step in the right direction assuming everythin...

It's amazed me how much a couple of weeks more or less in a hospital bed, a dose of nasty chemicals and a touch of kindergarten snuffles has knocked it out of me.  Susan has kept me on my back legs tromping up and down the path at JBL - we're now up to a lap and a half (the long half, the clubhouse not quite being in the middle) a day now as well as much tromping up and down the basement stairs to retrieve things and put things away. Yesterday I decided to upgrade the speakers on our main television.  Oddly enough, Samsung (and, I suspect, all television makers) don't put external speaker sockets on their televisions.  Maybe they regard that as confessing that their built in speakers are crap.  So Plan B was called for - disembowel a pair of computer speakers to get at the amplifier and hook up a decent pair of speakers to it, bypassing the cruddy speakers that are in most computer speakers.  Then plug it into the headphone socket.  The sound is noticeably...

Had a lovely walk at JBL (the local soccer park) today.  It's a pretty flat half mile walk except for having to scale the north face of the Eiger to get from field level to concession stand level in the middle of the walk. Be that as it may, I thought it might be a help to you if I were to translate part of a recent medical report for you.  This is the surgeon's report on the removal of the catheter through which I received chemo drugs and gave blood samples while in hospital.  I was more than happy to have it removed. IR CVC REMOVAL TUNNELED, 1/10/2017 10:12 AM    CONSENT: The specific risks and benefits of the procedure were explained to the patient, including pain, bleeding, infection, and damage to adjacent structures. The patient and present family members expressed understanding of these risks and subsequently provided written consent.    SEDATION: None. ( Make the bastard suffer)    TECHNIQUE:    The...

Please note that the title of this page isn't "My number is up."  Susan and I have just returned from Cancer Care in Asheville where my latest blood sample reveals that all the numbers they look at to judge the quality of my blood are now in the "acceptable" range.  I even have enough hemoglobin to let me give blood though, given all the other crap floating around in my veins, I think my blood giving days are over.  I also apologise to anyone who's been given a pint of mine in the last couple of years.

Now that most of my hair (mostly the dark ones) has fallen out and my beard, with the exception of the moustache, has decided to do likewise, I get told who I look like.  Some I take as a compliment, some I don't.  Here's the offerings thus far :- Basil Fawlty Neville Chamberlain Me Tom Selleck

Now that the drama is over, I'm backing off the daily bog entries.  I'll keep the blog going and record any significant events (like today's farewell to what was left of my beard) but, other than that, it's going to be an occasional update. Today saw my first serious venture outside since Christmas - about a half mile walk on the concrete paths at J B Lewis soccer ground.  I've spent many happy afternoons there, reffing soccer, and doing around 10 miles on a good afternoon.  Today's half mile walk darn near did me in so my fitness has a way to go.  At a more appropriate level, I started the 4 dimensional map of London (it includes time) that Susan gave me for Christmas.  As I lived there, using the picture this time really would be cheating though I'm hanged if I know where various companies' head office buildings are unless they are vaguely notable / ugly (talking to you, Lloyd's Bank). I also forgot to thank someone very important yesterday but n...

What a wondrous night's sleep last night.  The giant mug of ginger tea just before going to bed probably wasn't the best idea I've ever had but once I'd disposed of it, I slept soundly.  Even dreamt for the first time in days though I can't remember what. I enjoyed a long hot shower this morning but was mildly distressed to see the carpet of hair in the bottom once I'd done.  My head is as thinly populated as Trump's now and there is so little left of my beard that I am going to shave the rest off.  My moustache is resolutely hanging in there but it can go, too. Besides feeling great, there's not much to report so, in the spirit of the Golden Globes, I'd like to list a load of people I'd like to thank.  Alas, they are all nurses at Wake Forest so I don't think I'm allowed to mention their names so here, instead is what I want to thank them for:- Putting up with my total lack of comprehension and co-operation in the middle of the night...

Made it!  I had an odd night in hospital last night as I was no longer attached to Marvin.  The nurses still came and took some blood to see if I was in good shape for my minor op later in the day.  They also changed the battery on my monitor and came and hooked me up to a drop of oxygen when my oxygenated hemoglobin concentration fell into the lower 80s.  Awake and ready to roll at 7, I finally stirred out of bed at about 7:30.  Nothing much to do before my port removal at 11 so all the time in the world.  Time to order breakfast. Breakfast always takes a while to arrive so bags of time for an approximation to a shower.  Not one of the 15 minute ones I've been treating myself to but a sort one targeted entirely at washing my hair while I still have some.  I've lost, at a guess, half my hair but from all over my head so it just looks like I'm thinning out.  After much time shrouding my sundry bits of electronics in Press&Sea...

It's now reached the stage where I can't move without a cloud of hair wafting around me.  But, when I look in the mirror, I don' t look much different.  They've offered me the option of having my head shaved and I may yet go for that rather than looking like a bum.  Been awake since 4 a.m. but, having slept a solid 6 hours up until then, I don't feel bad.  I'm hoping that this is my last day here, not that it hasn't been OK but I would like to sleep in a room without the lights on.  And don't tell Marvin but I won't miss him, either.  Room service could be a different matter. The docs have just been on their rounds and assure me that I am, indeed, going home tomorrow.  Lots of warnings not to do anything nuts like go out for a buffet dinner: I'm not leaving the house for a couple of weeks until I have a working immune system.

It's finally happening - my hair and beard are falling out.  So are some areas of body hair but I don't notice them as much as I do getting a mouthful of moustache every time I eat and a hair behind my glasses when I am trying to read.  I'm not sure what the nice lady who cleans my room is singing all the time (it's mostly "La la la") but I suspect it's the Get this Hairy Git Off My Clean Floor Song. My RSV (aka kindergarten snuffles) really kicked in last night and I alternately lay awake and slept with my mouth open until it was like the Kalahari, at which point I'd drink a pint of iced water which meant I was up to pee an hour later.  Not the most satisfying night's kip I've ever had but at least I was dreaming when they woke me up.  My nice doctor tells me I could be out of here on Tuesday so I will spend tomorrow packing in readiness. Not much appetite today, either though I have discovered that there are pancakes and grilled pork on t...

A patchy night's sleep last night which is odd because the nurses don't come and get my vital signs during the night since I had the Dick Tracy gizmo put on.  (read all about it at http://newatlas.com/visi-mobile-wireless-health-monitoring/25583/)  So out of bed about 7 and, having gathered enough of my wits to find the bathroom, my day started in the usual way.  Or would have done if somebody hadn't put the cap back on the bottle I am supposed to pee in.  Minor flooding disaster more or less averted, I grabbed a seat by the window to watch the snow which was falling thick and fast.  The on-ramp here has a strange profile - I think its gradient increases as you approach the freeway - so I reveled in the schadenfreude of watching pickup trucks get stuck going up it.  Problem solved by an 18 wheeler that jack-knifed on the on-ramp (only the driver's dignity was damaged) though he, with some help from a couple of cops, managed to get himself going again a...

At last I have been hungry enough to eat 3 meals today.  And I mean eat, not pick at for an hour in attempt to get them down the hatch.  [Grossness alert] Real high spot of today is that they have removed the "hat" from my toilet in which I have been crapping for the last week.  It'll be nice to flush again, even though the toilet does it itself. [End of grossness] I have two signs on my door warning that anyone coming in here should wear gloves and a plastic gown, not touch me (doesn't apply to the medical staff) or let me sneeze on them.  Walking up and down the corridors {no comma, thank you Swhite} I have noticed a number of other doors adorned with the same notices so there's obviously a bit of an outbreak of Stevie Ray Vaughan disease.  A quick google thereof reveals that it's a disease prevalent in kids who are 3 and younger.  They weren't kidding when they said my immune system had been rebooted. Talking of google, I had yet another phone call fr...

No 13 hours sleep last night.  The Dick Tracy gizmo on my wrist is connected via wi-fi to a number monitoring stations around the place that show is your bed's flat, sitting up, what you pulse and Blood pressure are and all sorts of other stuff.  As inevitably happens with new computer gear, there was a glitch that crashed the wi-fi on this floor, even the guest internet access.  No problem - early night.  Except that the computer in my room (and, presumably, everyone else's) decided to beep every 4 seconds to alert me to the fact that it couldn't talk to the network.  So at 11 pm I was reduced to watching "Are You Being Served" on PBS.  Sophisticated British humour at its best. Got up at 8 a.m., ordered breakfast and got my laundry organised and in the machine.  It was cooked by about 9:30 and I shoved it in the drier which I think gets its heat from a 5 watt light bulb as it took 2 hours to dry half a dozen shirts and some garments of a more intimat...

You know how people can't sleep in hospital?  Well, I slept 13 hours last night, give or take having pipes changed and blood pressure taken.  It's now 3:15 pm (5 hours after I got up) and I need a nap.  I think I may be turning into a cat. Big news of the day is that they have kitted me out like the Bionic Man. Quick guided tour - on my left shoulder is the 3 pipe port through which I get the gunk they pump into me and they take blood samples from me.  The others are EKG sensors, for which they shaved my manly growth.  They are connected to a cool Dick Tracy gizmo on my right wrist that tells you what my heart rate, blood pressure, respiratory rate and oxygen uptake are. If anything goes out of whack, the thing on my wrist beeps and, having given me 15 seconds to stop whatever it was that I was doing, it beeps my nurses really loudly.  Very high tech but it appears that the wrist thingy doesn't like me typing with my left hand and thinks my heart ...

Last night I said I would text Susan about 6 a.m to wish her well at school.  That worked well as I slept until nearly 8 o'clock and woke up ready for anything.  Still in slo-mo though so, by the time I'd got myself dressed, not showered (Marvin doesn't like getting wet) and breakfasted it was midday.  Not sure what happened in between other than reading the comics from Sunday's paper and deciding once more that I don't like CNN. Took 4 laps of the walking track at a brisk pace and didn't need to make a bathroom dash en route which was (or wasn't) a relief.  Skipped lunch (thought of it turned me up) but I've just ordered dinner with a view to grazing on it for an hour or so.  I started on a jigsaw from home but it's too big for the tray in my room so I'll take it to the activity room tomorrow and see if there's a bigger table.  At least I've got the edge put together (which is how I know it's too big for the tray). Had a nice nap t...

It's been an eventful day today, at least for me if not on a global scale.  I decided to wake up shortly after 8 and ordered another yummy breakfast from room service.  Also delighted that my attack on yesterday's diarrhea by eating bananas and apple sauce had paid off.  Only obvious medical problem that I have now (other than what I'm here for) is that my blood pressure is insane - 197 / 104 at the last taking.  I can feel my arm bone crushing as they take it. Susan braved the elements - rain, not snow, though it's in the forecast for Thursday - to come and visit today and it was an absolute delight.  She brought the cribbage board and a brand new pack of cards and we played several games while catching up on each other's news.  She also brought some top-up supplies of clothes, ginger ale and a jigsaw without a cute pussycat on it.  Somehow I managed to skip lunch and I must stop doing that - eating when you're really not hungry isn't much fun but ...

I have now reached the Hazmat suit stage - all the nurses put on plastic gowns when they come to see me because of the chemo I am getting.  Woke up pretty dopy this morning having had as good a night's sleep as you can get when you get plugged in, unplugged, pumped up every couple of hours.  Once again, breakfast had no appeal but I decided to go to war on my constipated gut and ordered a trayful of appropriate weaponry.  Having taken Marvin for 3 laps of the track, I settled back in my room to do some crosswords, catch up on the news (it was different from yesterday's) and contemplate unfriending some people on Facebook who are just a bit weird.  By early afternoon, my nuclear breakfast was letting me know that I had grossly overdone it and so I ordered a lunch designed to have the opposite effect.  Being hooked up to Marvin all day, I didn't get to take a shower until 4 pm. Susan was going to come and visit today but, as it's a 4 hour roundtrip and I didn't ...