We made it back from Atlanta, after spending a couple of days doing a few tests. When I say a few, here is a rundown. I had a PET SCAN early in the morning that essentially lasts about 2 hours. We had a small break for lunch then headed out to do labs. The labs weren’t just any normal labs they collected 22 vials of blood, YES, 22 vials. They are running all types of infectious disease tests and much more to make sure that I will be ready for this stem-cell transplant.

We then went over to a different area of the hospital and met with our BMT nurse who went over our treatment calendar for the next 3-5 weeks. I’ll be talking more about that in other blogs but basically, we spent about an hour with her discussing the stem cell transplant process and the many hospital visits to come.

We finished the day with a Chest x-ray, EKG, and an Echo, that was all in one day… results… we must wait until next week to find out if my body is strong enough to proceed with the stem cell transplant as scheduled.

If I get the thumbs up, the next step to this process is installing a PICC line that has 3 different lines so they can connect a machine that will be collecting my stem cells. I forget how much blood this thing pumps out of my body per minute, but it sounded like too much to ask more questions. They will be collecting anywhere between 6 to 9 million stem cells from my body during a 2 to 3-day span.

This will be happening next week or depending on when you read this it would’ve happened during the week of February 28,2022. Once again, this will be another 4 to 5 days stay in Atlanta.

I think the worst of all of this is, is the expense of traveling to these appointments to Atlanta just between food and gas we roughly spent about $200, and it was just 2 days. We can’t even imagine what the expense of 4 to 5 days will be and then even more trips for the actual transplant. I want to take a moment to thank those of you who have taken the time to become a Jose’s Hero since every bit that we receive does help us. 

For those of you who haven’t and are looking for a way to support my cancer journey. There are varying support levels to help ease the burden of the travel and the diminished capacity to work.  For the last few months, I haven’t been able to take on the same level of work as I could pre-cancer. Trust me, if I had extra cash sitting around for travel, I wouldn’t be spending it on trips to the hospital to get poked and prodded.  LOL

Later this week I must also start taking some injections, like diabetics taking insulin. I must give myself shots! These shots will make my body think that it’s sick and I may end up feeling not so great this weekend. The reason for these shots is to increase the amount of stem cells it creates so it will stimulate my bone marrow and get me ready for the extraction that will happen early next week.

That’s all for this week. I will update you further next week when I am in Atlanta. In the meantime, please feel free to share my story so we can help encourage other cancer warriors.

Thank you all for your love and support.

“Thank you for following my journey. If you have the means and wish to contribute to my program by becoming a ‘Jose’s Hero’ where $10 per month can really help us help others I invite you to review our progam. In the meantime, join our Today with José email updates below.”