Day 16 - Punchin' the Time Clock

Sometimes Tyler and I talk about how fighting cancer is a full time job. Tyler works every day to eat and exercise and sleep enough for his body to heal. It's definitely a lot for him to worry about, especially if our schedule is disrupted.

Today was one of those days that felt a bit like work. We had our first appointment at SCCA at 9:15 this morning and didn't leave until just after 5pm. There is cause for celebration after today's visit, however.

After our lab appointment we had clinic with our team nurse and team doctor. They schedule these once a week to keep tabs on Tyler and make sure things are still going well. Our nurse, Jackie, checked Tyler's vitals when we first got there. When our doctor, Peter, got there he asked if Jackie had told us the good news. Jackie hadn't said anything about good news, so they got my curiosity up.

Still we had to ask what was up. It turns out that Tyler is doing SO well that they are stopping the IV antibiotic and switching the Tacrolimus to pill form. We were going into the clinic for daily infusions for those two items, which meant at least a few hours there every day. With this schedule change, we think most of our days will be lab draws, once a week clinics, and physical therapy appointments.

In addition, they will be stopping the Filgrastim shots either today or tomorrow. They've warned us that the blood counts will probably drop a little bit once they stop giving Tyler that booster shot, but we can live with that (especially since the shots are painful to get).

So... Are you ready to hear Tyler's blood counts from today?

WBC: 2.11 thousand (normal 4-10)
ANC: 1.79 thousand (normal > 1.0)
HCT: 26 % (normal 37-52%) --> We got red blood transfusions today
PLT: 17 (normal 150-400)

His hematocrit (HCT) was 26% yesterday, so I was pleased to see that had held steady. And his Platelets (PLT) got a good bump from the platelet transfusion yesterday.