biopsy #1

So, my bone marrow biopsy and aspiration was today and let’s just say that my anxiety over the procedure was 10X worse than the actual biopsy! I also now understand why I have never really *broken* anything :-).

I had to be up at the hospital at 8:00am, so my Mom who was in for a few days took Jacey to breakfast and then to school. Once Bry and I got there, they took me back and par for the course as it seems in the military, there was some confusion because they were supposed to do lab work on me first. Two sticks and one blown vein later, they got my labs done. Then it was time for the actual procedure.

I had to lay down on my stomach and Bry was able to stay in the room with me and hold my hand. I put some relaxing music on the ipod and away they went. First was a lot of poking and prodding while they felt around trying to figure out where a good spot would be. Then they prepped me and numbed me…7 vials of lidocaine later! I told my doc that maybe I should have warned her that I have a high tolerance to meds :-). After that, I felt a lot of pressure and tugging but no pain. I could tell by overhearing the conversation, that they were not happy and couldn’t really get what they needed. Supposedly, my blood coagulated practically instantly once they pulled it out of me and that my bones are so hard that I bent their steel rod and needle assembly. Normally hard bones would be a good thing, less chance of osteoporosis in later life ,but not in this instance. Because of the difficulties, she gave me two options; try the other side or send off what they did get and hope it was good enough and if not, come back in for another biopsy but this time under general anesthesia so they can be more aggressive. She and I both opted for the latter as eventually I was worried that I would fee something.

So, now we wait…results should be back in about 2 weeks.

Afterwards, my doc stayed in the room and talked to us for about 15-20 minutes…different options and different ideas. She has been consulting with the 3 transplant docs at Wilford Hall on my situation. One, known for being more aggressive says get me in NOW for a bone marrow transplant since that is the only cure. The other two as well as my doc are a bit more relaxed about it. They want to see my pathology results first and know whether I have an aggressive form and just how progressed it is. There could be several years of just monitoring before I would even need to think about chemo and/or a transplant. Ultimately though, we would have to medical PCS to most likely San Antonio as I would have Wilford Hall for my main care and a transplant center there as well (I would not be able to do a transplant at Wilford hall because they can’t do non-familial transplants yet and I have no full-blood siblings to attempt a match there). Chemo though, could be given here. My doc is looking into going ahead and trying to find me a donor match from the National Marrow Registry. We are not sure if we’ll be able to or not since matching is expensive and our hospital here may not be equipped to do the collections, etc.

In the meantime, I am doing okay…some days are better than others. I think my biggest fear right now is the day I have to tell Jacey. She is smart, often times too smart for her own good and picks things up quickly. I just don’t want her to be scared that I am going to die *today* or push me away. We have such a close relationship that I can’t bear the thought of losing that.