Sept. 29th

I settled in Seattle again. I spent a week and a half visiting family and friends. Begun my transplant process on Sept. 28th. I was given melphalan (the bomb chemo) and lots of IV fluids afterward. During the whole process that started at 9 am and lasted until 2 pm and was required to suck on ice chips. They have found that keeping your mouth cold while given the melphalan will help the mouth and throat sores not to be so severe.
Today is -1 day before transplant and tomorrow will be 0 day. Rebirth of my bone marrow. Melphalan wipes out all new growth cells in your body which means it wiped out the cells in the bone marrow as well as new cells growing in my mouth, throat, stomach, hair,etc. Tonight I am doing well. I had a bout with nausea last night and took some extra anti-nausea pills and laid down for awhile. After the pills took effect, I was able to eat dinner.
The nurse says it will take until about Friday before the worse to hit. Need to watch my temp constantly because any fever will put me into the hospital immediately.
Continue to pray for speedy recovery with little or no side effects.
God bless you all and thank you so much for the prayers. Becky

Sep 18th

It has been over two weeks since I last updated. I saw my doctor on Sept. 9th and all my blood counts were pretty much normal. They scheduled my transplant on Sept. 30th which puts my chemo (bomb) on Sept. 28th. I go back to see my doctors on Sept. 23rd for last minute consultation. I have to see the dentist again on Sept. 22nd to make sure my teeth are very clean.

I was able to go to the intro class for BSF (Bible Study Fellowship) on Sept. 15th . I am so excited to start BSF again. They are going through the book of John this year. I will also be going to Oregon on the 20th and 21st to visit with all the managers for Tree of Life. I don't have to go and since I miss everyone and only get to see them twice a year as it is I am really excited to go. Sunday night is dinner and fellowship and Monday morning I will only stay till lunch. I hoping to see how my store did last year for sales since our fiscal year ends in July. Tough year last year with all the snow closures in December and the slow economy. Looking forward to a better year this year with the 2010 Olympics coming up in February. I hope to be back to work by then God willing. It all depends on how my body responses to the transplant.

Believe it or not my hair decided to finally fall out. I am completely bald now. I woke up Sunday morning and noticed quite a bit a hair on my pillow. Took a shower that night and washed my hair and I had a handful after rubbing my hand across it once. Strange sight. By Tuesday it was pretty much bald.

I had the opportunity to attend an 8th grade graduation meeting with Josh's school and open house this week. I guess they have an official skip day the day before graduation and throughout the school year they do fund raisers for the cost of the trip and cost of graduation. I still need to put in volunteer time sometime this year so I decided to apply for substitute teaching and volunteer to substitute a couple of times this next year. If my health is up to it, I hope to help with the winter trip which will be in January.

I just got a call from volunteer services a moment ago and my name was drawn for tickets to any one of the Mariners games this weekend. They are playing the Yankees. My sister-in-law came up this week to visit and she is a fanatic for the Mariners like me. I couldn't believe I won tickets again. So, we are going to really enjoy ourselves.

Pray for my health as I continue to work to stay healthy before my transplant. 10 days to chemotherapy. Pray for my trip to Oregon. Looking forward to seeing everyone in Eugene.

Thank God for the many blessings he has blessed me with this last month. Love you all.

Becky

September 7th

I am sitting her at SCCA this morning. Something is wrong with the internet in my apartment but I get free access here at the clinic and I couldn't wait to update you all. As I mentioned, my cd-34s were at a count of 65 unexpected by my doctors. I started apheresis on Friday(that is the machine that collects my stem cells). Friday night I got a call informing me that I just collect over 20 billion stem cells. I only needed to get 10 billion for two transplants. My doctor said it would be difficult to get that many collected let alone be able to collect it all in one day.

God is our miracle worker. I still sit here amazed at what my body has done in healing itself. I praise God continually for the strength I have and the way I keep bouncing back. Since the doctors keep telling me to not expect much and then I amazingly exceed those expectations, we know it is an act of God. He is the miracle worker. I can't wait to glorify God when I am completely healed when this stem cell process is done.

My doctor wants to put me on a maintenance therapy after the transplant convinced my cancer will be back in less than a year(normal for my type of myeloma). I researched the medicine she suggests which is a histone, type of protein our body normally uses. It supposedly helps to keep the cancer cells from reproducing and it doesn't have any serious side effects and it is just a pill that I take 14 out of 28 days plus velcade 2x a month. Pray for wisdom.

Sept 3rd update

I am sitting totally amazed at what happen today. Just a quick overview of
what my nurse keeps me updated on. Last Fri by White blood cell counts
were over 20.0. Norms run between 4.3-10.0. That was because the steriod
Dex was giving my body lots of energy right after chemo from what I
figured. Sat. I dropped to 17.6. Here is the rest of the week 2.9, .65,
.25, .39. The day I was .25 I had no energy level. Slept most of the day.
Melanie was starting to get sick and immediately left the house afraid she
would get me sick. I had no neutophils (thats the stuff in your body that
fights infection). 0, none nada. You get the point. I called my oldest son
who by the grace of God came home from his summer job last Thurs and was
able to come help me. Of course, I asked the nurse when she thought I
might start on the machine. She said maybe a couple of days or maybe as
far out as Labor Day. No real encouragement. Just go with the flow. (I
never lost any hair either). So, yesterday she said if my wbc goes over
1.0 then they will do a cd-34 which will give a indication how many of
those little itty bitty baby stem cells are floating around in my blood. Ok
fine. Don't expect it to be much more that 10 and I will still get my cell
growth stimulating drug. Surprisingly by white blood cell count jumped to
1.67. Large jump from .39. So, back down to the labs to give more blood. I
told the technician they must like my blood they sent me down again. 4
hours later I should be getting a phone call informing me of my cd-34
count. If it doesn't make it to 10, we will wait another day. Well, after
being cooped up for two entire days. I got passes for my son and I to go to
the Seattle aquariam(kids are back to school in Seattle). Trick is to get
down there on the bus and not being around crowds. Its a Thurs. We need
get through Pike place market. Hopefully, there won't be much of a crowd
around 1 to 2. Wrong. I am suppose keep a ten foot bubble around me. We or
shall I said I looked funny. We stood in the middle of the street away from
everybody. I have my face cover with my coat waiting for an opening to the
downstairs. Once there was we made a beeline through the opening. Whew, no
crowds after that. Spent a wonderful day at the aquariam and decided to go
to the Old Spaghetti factory after that. Before we left the aquariam, my
nurse managed to call my son, John, I never left his phone #. My phone had
gone out of service under the dome and she must of tried to call me then.
I was talking to Melanie that is why I knew I lost reception. I talked to
the nurse and she said good news we can start on the machine tomorrow be
in at ll. Here is what is so amazing. My cd-34 count was 65. They were not
expecting to make 10 let alone more than 20. My doctor keeps saying that
because of the type of drugs I was on it was going to be difficult to even
get enough stem cells for two transplants. She even made be undo my signature on
research that could use my extra stem cells I would possibly have because I won't
have enough .
Isn't God totally awesome. My body has never been the norm. In fact, she
told me I needed to go get some pain releivers because as the cells are
trying to crowd out of my bone marrow I would be in a lot of pain. It
would help me sleep. When I went in today, she asked how my pain was and
how did I sleep. I looked at her dumpfounded. I felt something was
happening. My back was weak and my left thigh was tender. What about my
skull. Fine. Scale of 1-10. Maybe .5. She even told me that if the pain
gets any worse some people have to even get morphine because they can't
handle it. Its ok, to cry and ask for morphine if I needed. And, what do I
do today. Walk all around the aquariam. Walk 13 blocks to the spaghetti
factory, then up hill several blocks to the bus. I have not been feeling
any pain. Relaxed tonight watching a movie and feeling great so I decided
to email and update my blogspot.
I know I'm crazy but you know life needs to be enjoyed to its fullest. God
has everything under control. Besides, I am going to be completely healed
and live to 100 years old. Can't keep me down. (p.s. Mark and Debra I may
still come to the meeting if I'm not to busy).
God Bless you all and love you all. Becky

August 31

A week has gone by since I had the cytoxan. I remember as the nurse was hooking up the IV, I watched her but on extra plastic clothing and mentioned to her that it looked like she was handling poision. I told her I mentioned the cytozan sounded like poison in my email and she said it is but of course it was going to help me. I was only knocked out for the day and they keep me on Dex for three days after. I didn't fill sick at all and was wishing I could go to work. I go in everyday to take blood tests and receive the G-CSF (nueprogen) to build up my stem cells. The dex they gave me kept my energy level high and kept my White blood cells high. Once the dex wore off, my white blood cells will drop to almost zero and I have to stay away from everyone until they build back up. If I get sick right now and run any type of temperature, I call the clinic and head straight for the hospital. When they begin to rise again, I will be put on an apheresis(means to withdraw) machine that will circulate my blood through and remove the baby stem cells. This process will take 2-4 days and could take up to 6 hours. Then I will be free for several weeks while by body stabilizes for the next round of chemo. The doctor put it like this, the chemo I received the last few months was like a ruler tapping on my body. Cytoxan was like getting hit by a bat(which I believe because I definitely had a headache). Mephalan(sp?) is like a bomb. I ask you to pray that I don't get any infections these next few days and the process for stem cell collection will go well. Pray God continues to work in my heart to be his servant and to stay in his word. He has put my doctor on my heart and I pray for her often(She reminds me of myself, she works too much). Its hard not being in the store and help people with their needs but I got to remember Gods plans are always bigger than mine and If I want to work their till retirement, He can help to heal me completely. I hope to continue to inspire those around me and help remind them that God is always the blessed controller of all things. Praise God.

Update from Becky - August 24th

Its August 24th. Just got back from the Mariners game. For those of you
who didn't know, I won tickets at SCCA last week for this game. My doctor
had scheduled my chemo to start today but I told her she needed to change
it because I was going to the game. Boy, am I glad I did. It was a great
game. Mariners beat the Oakland Athletics 3-1. Lopez and Griffy hit home
runs. The seats were amazing. They were club seats on the right field
line. Enough of the game.
Tomorrow is my first round of Chemo, cytoxan, I will be at the clinic at
7:45 until 7 or 8 at night. This is getting my body ready to harvest my
stem cells. My doctor said that it may be difficult to get enough stem
cells for two transplants because of how long I was on the previous
treatment. They have learned Revlimid makes it hard to produce enough stem
cells. I was on that since March. Pray this isn't going to be that way for
me. That my body will bounce back quickly after the cytoxan(definitely
sounds like a poison). If my body has difficulty producing the stem cells,
the time on the machine to retrieve them may be longer which could cause
me to have transfusion during the process.
The rest of the week will involve blood tests and giving me nueprogen,
which is the G-csf, growth-cell stimulating factor. Thats all I know so
far. I won't know the rest of my schedule until sometime during the end of
this week.
God Bless and thank all of you for the many prayers that are going up for me.
Cards and notes are great. My address is 1200 Boylston Ave. #305, Seattle,
WA 98101. Found out the fresh flowers and plants are very bad. They can
carry bacteria.

Becky

Update from Becky - August 19, 2009

Well I saw my doctor today. Here is wants up. Thursday I will have the
Hickman placed at the University of Washington Hospital. I will definitely
be out of it that day. Tuesday we will start the cytoxin, chemo that will
wipe out by body and Wednesday they will give me G-something something to
enchance the growth of my stem cells. The biggest concern she has is that
I may have difficulty in getting the 10 million stem cells needed for two
transplants since I was receiving treatment for so long. Normally they try
to get you in sooner after treatment begins like she wanted me in last
Jan. or Feb. but that wasn't possible. I may need more transfusions
because they will probably have to take more blood out of me. So, for
about 2 weeks I will go in have a shot of nuepragen, another stem cell
enhancement, and be hooked up to a machine that will take out my blood
which through the process will take my stem cells and return the left over
blood to me. If my stem cells are low, I will have to stay on the machine
longer than most and this is where I could lose too much blood and may
need the transfusions. The good news is the myeloma cells dropped in my
bone marrow down to .9% from the 80-90% at diagnosis. Bad news is that
they found more bone lesions from the MRI. I asked if my hips were part of
that because I have lots of pain in my hips. At night, in bed I have to
constantly roll over until I don't feel any pain. Ron always tells me I
waddle which I knew because my hips hurt. They found lesions in my hips,
on my L2 lumber, and my neck along with the original ones on my skull and
right femur. So, I was definitely stage 3 at diagnosis. The reason for the
transplant is to stop the growth of these lesions and wipe out the myeloma
cells.

My prayer is that they will get plenty of stem cells quickly with little
problems and I don't need any transfusions. The treatment will wipe out
the rest of the myeloma cells and stop the growth of these lesions and I
will bounce back quickly.

Remember the joy of the Lord is my strength. God will be gloried as He
gives the doctors wisdom in all they do. God be praised. Amen

God Bless and love you all for your constant prayer and concerns.