John is not doing too bad

Hi.  Sorry it has taken awhile to get back.  Let me tell you what is going on.  And let me also say that I am sorry this journal has turned into a medical logue, and not much of anything else.  It used to be a lot more fun!  But it seems I don't have time to write much anymore except about what is going on with John's health.  Not that I don't want to write about my beloved.  But maybe in the next few days I will get a chance to do a few fun entries.  We shall see.    

So John and I arrived up here at Hershey Medical Center Thursday in the middle of the night.  I guess you could say it was really very early Friday morning.  We called the oncologist at Hershey Medical Center (the hospital) on Thursday night because John had a fever.  He said to come up to the hospital right away.  The reason John had to come in right away is because John's WBC is below 1 and his ANC is 0.  So he has virtually no immune system.  If you catch something when you have no immune system, it can kill you.  Because you have no capacity to fight it off.  So John had to get to the hospital right away, so they could find out what he had, and treat him.

Well, they started John on antibiotics immediately.  Good thing they did, because the cultures they took showed that John had two blood infections, both requiring antibiotics.  It appears that the antibiotics are taking effect, because John's fever is very minimal.  The antibiotic is keeping it down.  The doctors are doing further tests to pinpoint the exact kind of infections he has, to even better find out a more specific kind of antibiotic to fit John's needs.

The doctors are also trying to discover why John has a compromised immune system in the first place.  Why he doesn't have much white blood cells to fight off infection.  They are planning on doing a bone marrow biopsy (major ouchie for John!).  I think they will do that next week.  I am also wondering if the transplant is still working fully, or if something is wrong because of the low white blood count.  I imagine that if the transplant is not taking, then it will show up in the bone marrow biopsy.  Please, Jesus, don't let John go out of remission and get bone marrow cancer back.

John is still requiring blood.  But only two units (bags) once a week, twice a week at the most.  I asked the oncologist today if John was going to have to get two bags of blood every week for the rest of his life.  Because John lives at a very anemic level, and is always very close to needing blood.  His problem that he left the hospital for two weeks ago has not been resolved yet.  It is better, but not fixed.  The oncologist said, no, that John would continue to improve, and would not require blood like that for the rest of his life.  He said he would stop back and talk to us about it.  But he never did.  I did go back to Hope Lodge for a few hours though, so I might have missed him.  I am staying at Hope Lodge again, on Friday morning I got a place there.  But some nights I just stay over in the hospital room.  I think I will do that tonight.

So all in all, John could be doing a lot worse.  Yes, better, but yes, worse.  He doesn't seem to be completely weak.  Maybe that is because he had two bags of blood yesterday.  And his fever is down.  He stays in his room with the door closed so he doesn't catch anything.  he is allowed to leave the room, if he has a mask on.  So we went for a few walks in the hall today, and sat out near the nurse's station just to get a change of pace.  I believe he is doing well because he wasn't able to make it to the nurse's station for a whole month during his last hospital stay.  He is not nearly as weak this stay.  Of course, there is always the possibility of dying if your ANC is 0, but I am not going to think of that right now.  

Ok, so that's about it.  Hope to do that light hearted entry soon!

Love you all, Krissy :)