Clarifying what's next

Dale was tired Saturday. Probably from the chemo, duh! Spirits still positive and nurses enjoy his company. Nice. Keeps the days more bearable.

I feel that I may need to clarify what the process is for the next several months. There are two combinations of chemotherapy formulas. "A" formula means Dale stays at Huntsman for 8 days with several drip lines at different rates the entire stay. "B" formula means Dale stays for 6 days with another cocktail of chemotherapy constantly the whole time. That is a lot of drugs! He will have 6 to 8 rounds of "A" & "B" formulas. There will be about 15 days in between the chemo and then start the next. For ease in knowing where we are in the cycles 1A &1B, 2A & 2B, and so forth will be used referring to what cycle it is. That means there is 336 hours of chemotherapy for each cycle. When Dale is done with this one, he will have 672 hours of chemo.

 Once the chemo is completed, the bone marrow transplant (BMT) process will begin. This may seem strange, since his stem cells were harvested last week as part of the BMT but they had to harvest them at an optimal time to be used later. If there are no complications and the schedule is followed as set, the BMT may begin about end of February or March. One hundred days are planned for BMT. Several weeks in the hospital in a negative atmosphere room, then a couple of weeks home with 24 hour care to watch for health changes. They give him a BEAM chemotherapy at that time also.

 Doctors say he is doing well. They adjust the rate for the speed the chemo is administered, check PH balances, blood counts, and all sorts of things to help him out. The main issue he had last round was with diarrhea which seems to be in check now. Yeah for all of us on that one. We have the routines in order and proceeding fine. I, on the other hand, am a mess. I feel overwhelmed and incompetent. Concentration is over powered by care of cancer and it's needs. That's all.