Deepika's Diary
26 APRIL 2000
Day -1
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Sleep is still a luxury. I had a slight fever only over night. By morning my fever had subsided.
I went for my TBI this morning around 8:30am. The rest of the morning I was feeling good. I manage to eat a little and didn't feel too sick.
Due to my low red blood cell count I was feeling very tired and weak for the rest of the day.
My round of ATG went off well, no reaction today.
I went for my TBI in the evening at 5:30pm. All went well.
I didn't spike any temperatures today either, thanks to Tylenol.
A little bit of technical stuff about blood counts. Blood consist of red cells, white cells & platelets and other stuff which is way too technical for us non medical people. My blood counts tells me how I will be feeling at any given time. When my red cell count is low i.e. below 80 then I feel really weak and tired. When my white cell count is low i.e. below 4 then I have to be careful of infections and fevers. When my platelet count is low i.e. below 20 then I could get bruised and bleed easily.
In order for me get a bone marrow transplant my white cell count has to be as close to 0 as possible because Leukemia is the disease of the white blood cell. Chemotherapy and radiation kills off cancer cells but also reduces my white cell count.Today my white cell count is 0.2. You do not get blood transfusions for low white bood cell counts.
My red blood cell count is 85 so I need 2 pints of blood. It will be giving to be overnight. It takes about 4 hours a pint.
My platelet count is 54 which is fine.
Anita did not have to have any stem cells removed today because the last two batches were good enough. The stem cells are ready and waiting for infusion on Thursday evening.