Megan arrived safely in Santorini, Greece yesterday morning. She phoned me to let me know she was booked into her room at the Kalma Hotel and was exhausted. She has no experience of travelling alone so I think it was a rude awakening, she almost missed one of her flights. She had a good sleep and then went exploring and had something to eat and basically went back to the hotel to sleep some more. I was telling her how lucky she is, as it is less than 24 hours since I have seen her and she already knows what a Greek Island looks like. She said it is absolutely beautiful and could not stop smiling in the taxi on route to the hotel. She says it looks exactly like the pictures of Greece. This morning she phoned at 7:30 am to say the taxi was collecting her in 20 minutes to drop her at the NCL Jade port. She sounded very refreshed and excited. I asked her to try and let me know once she is on the ship, even if it was just a quick text which she did about an hour after embarking. "MOM!!!!! I'm here x". From this 'tone' I know she is very impressed and happy to be there.
We had our end-of-4th-cycle-chemo appointment with Prof Novitzky yesterday evening and unfortunately the news was a bit disappointing. In the last month Jimmy's M protein level has not come down any further, it is still at 21 grams per litre of plasma. Prof's exact words were 'I do not believe in flogging a dead horse', so he has suggested that Jimmy come off chemo for now. He basically explained that Jimmy has now hit a plateau but unfortunately the protein level is still very high. He was hoping it would come down to 4 or 5. Jimmy will have another bone marrow biopsy done on Tuesday and this will tell Prof what the cancer burden is now,compared to the 36% that Jimmy started with. And then we will start preparing for the stem cell transplant. Once this is done, Jimmy will probably have some more chemo cycles again but due to the high M protein it will be intravenous and more than likely Velcade, instead of oral chemo tablets. He explained that it is quite common for the chemo to work better again post stem cell transplant. Prof says it is not all doom and gloom but he is very disappointed the M protein did not come down any further as the higher this number is prior to stem cell transplant, the shorter remission will be (once Jimmy goes into remission).
And then just to add to our woes....I woke up yesterday morning with a knot in my back next to my shoulder blade and by this morning I could not use my left arm or turn my head to the left or look up. Thankfully I had my appointment with Dr Gotlieb this morning (rheumatologist) and I was hoping he would be able to give me an injection for the pain while I was there. It turns out that I am a 'walking spring'. He says this is just a culmination of all the stress I have been through with Jimmy and now Megan leaving and travelling on her own. I even have high blood pressure, which I have never had before!
Oh well....on the positive side, post Tuesday's bone marrow biopsy, we can look forward to at least a 2 week break from chemo and driving through to UCTPAH while Jimmy builds up his blood counts. I'll have to do some exploring of my own, not in Santorini unfortunately, and see if we can go away for a few days at the end of the month.
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