One-Year Eval: Day One

The trip to my "second home" was quite routine and unremarkable. To guarantee that I could get a parking spot in the garage, I arrived at my appointment about an hour early. Since the doctors were playing golf out of the office this week, I had to meet with a lot of the "third-string" staff. Heck, my amyloid doctor for this visit looked like he just graduated from high school. (Or perhaps, I'm just getting old.)

After taking samples off all my bodily fluids, they snuck up the bone-marrow biopsy this afternoon. Usually they aren't schedule until Tuesday, but because of the low staffing, there was no choice to reschedule. Crap! Usually I bring some drugs with me to help with the anxiety, but not today. I was not prepared for getting my hip bone split in two today.

So, I bought some time, and pulled some strings and get one of the nurses to get me 1 mg of Ativan to dull my anxiety a bit. A pill under the tongue, 10 minutes of hiding from the nurse, and I was ready and relaxed for the procedure. The doctor performing the biopsy was a little clumsy, but he was excellent in the marrow extraction. The procedure was short, with very little pain. Much better than last time, and don't get me started about my first one in 2005.

Mental note for doctors: If you are in the room with a conscious patient, and make a mistake, try to refrain from saying the word, "Ooops". That is the last word the patient wishes to hear when he or she is being prodded at, is being cut open, or in any other type of uncompromising position. Might I suggest you say, "Aha!" instead? Thanks so much.

Anyway, no news at this point, as was expected. I won't hear anything until Wednesday at the earliest. The doctors are all upbeat about my status, and they don't see anything in my labs yet that would indicate a problem. One thing I was told that really bothered me was that I am probably no longer eligible for additional chemo therapies should I relapse again. The two high-dose melphalan treatments have already put me a high risk of getting leukemia, and they don't want to further increase that risk. I guess I will not have any choice but to get a clean bill of health, right? :)