Friday July 13th
was stem cell transplant day. Talk about luck! What an ominous day
to undergo something so risky. The nurse came in and weighed me. I had gained a
couple of kilos from all the liquid that had been pumped into me in the last
twenty-four hours. My left hand was swollen and I was afraid they would have to
cut my wedding rings off. I wished I had left them at home.
The
cleaning woman named Petie came in to my room just as I was exiting the toilet.
She was mopping the floor and warned me to tred carefully back to bed. I nodded
and stepped gingerly over the floor. Once I was settled back in bed, she told
me a hilarious story about a nurse in high heels who slipped and fell on a wet
floor in the reception area of the ward. Petie had warned her that the floor
was wet but she still walked across it four times. On the fourth pass she
slipped. She fell backwards, her legs sprawled apart, papers and high heels
flying across the room. She landed on her butt then got up slowly and
sheepishly asked if anyone saw where her shoes went. The way Petie told it I
could imagine every second of the woman’s determination, then mortification. We
were both nearly crying with laughter by the time she finished the story.
At 2pm the
stem cell transplant was under way. I had six bags of cells to get through at
about fifteen minutes a bag. That meant I should be finished in an hour and a
half. The bags were hooked up to the IV pole one by one and dripped into my arm
exactly like getting a blood transfusion. As each bag nearly finished, the next
was defrosted in preparation for hanging. It was all very low key and carried
out efficiently and confidently by two nurses. I felt well during the
transplant until five minutes before the end when a wave of nausea overtook me.
I threw up in a plastic cup kindly provided to me earlier. Apparently it was
the preservative the cells were frozen in that caused the nausea. Six bags full was a lot of preservative. When
the nurses finished, they hooked me up to another IV to keep me hydrated and
left. I sat there feeling a little stunned. I couldn’t believe that months of
anticipation and trepidation of what the process would be like were over. The
leaflets I had pored over on transplants, nutrition, the PICC, the melphalan,
the side effects and the dangers could now be shelved. For six months I had
been hearing about the autologous transplant. Now after an hour and a half, the
transplant was complete.
July 14th
was day plus one. I vomited again in the morning followed by diarrhea. The side
effects had begun. A bowl of cereal arrived on a tray at the same time. I gave
it a miss. I was feeling grungy but my white blood cell counts were good so I
was paroled for the night. I just had to promise to return the next morning for
a blood test. I agreed to the terms of my release. My mood brightened
exponentially. On day plus two I had to
return to the hospital for a blood count, but was released again for the night.
Psychologically it was the best medicine they could have given me. Logically
the nurse told me:
“You are
more at risk of catching something in the hospital than at home, so go home
while you can.”
On Day plus three,
Alex dropped me and Abby off at Auckland hospital. I was hoping for a repeat of
the previous day, a blood test and release. But my kidneys were in a bit of a
crisis. My creatinine level was 150. My normal level was around 60. The
preservative had damaged my kidneys. I needed lots of IV fluid to flush the
poison out of them. I was going to be hooked to an IV for the next four hours.
So instead of sitting in the room, Abby and I went for a walk. We left Auckland
Hospital through a connecting corridor and went into Starship Children’s
Hospital. In the centre of the hospital there was an atrium with a children’s
play area below it designed like a fantasy forest with timber poles as trees,
stepping stones, rocks and log benches. Four pretty pastel coloured lifts had
windows that looked out over the play area. We decided to ride the lifts for
fun. I nearly got crushed between the doors a couple of times when the wheels
of my IV pole got stuck in the grooves.
But I got better. We walked Starship’s cheerfully painted halls,
exploring and trying to use up some time. But as we passed the different
departments and saw parents and children outside doors waiting to see doctors,
the significance sunk in.
“It’s so
sad that parents have to spend every day here with their sick children,” I said
to Abby.
“Yes. I’m
glad that I never had to stay in hospital because of my eye disorder. It could
have been a lot worse.”
It is good
to re-establish that very thing in your life. Abby has a genetic eye condition
which causes low vision. But aside from not being able to drive or read some
signs, she has got on well in life. It isn’t often that we witnessed first-hand
how much worse it could be. It was very humbling.
On our way
back to Auckland Hospital, a woman in the lift was holding a small girl in her
arms. The girl was about three years old. Her mother was chatting with a doctor
standing next to her.
“My other
daughter has been in pain all her life, but Chloe.” she looked at the girl in
her arms, “has gotten off relatively easily.” Chloe lay silently like a rag
doll. It broke my heart.
The next
day was another blood test and another bad result on my creatinine level. It
had come down only slightly to 144. I was going to be given two litres of fluid
through an IV again. A hematologist named Jim came to see me and talked about
the effects of the freezing preservative on the kidneys.
“We’ve had
lots of talks about how to minimize the damage to the kidneys. We are thinking
that someone getting as much as six bags of cells should get their transplant
over two days instead of one.”
“Uh, huh.”
(Now they think of it!)
I wanted to ask if the kidneys were damaged permanently
but something stopped me.
“The kidney
problem is not a huge thing but its better avoided,” said Jim.
I was
relieved to hear that. Abby was with me again and I was anxious not to spend
another four hours in the hospital. The nurse negotiated with the doctor to
give me the two litres of IV fluid over two hours instead of four. My arm was
freezing as it was pumped in and I had to put a jacket over it. But when I was
released at 2pm instead of 4pm I figured it was worth it. I put my wig on and
Abby and I walked out of the hospital into the sunshine. But then near Auckland
University we collided with a crowd of hundreds of students. I saw them as
hundreds of germs and I wanted to go somewhere quiet fast. We negotiated our
way down to the waterfront end of Symonds Street and after turning off the
road, we came across an adorable café set out like an English pub. It was empty
and I thought it might be closing, but the owner invited us inside. We had a gorgeous coffee and a muffin. I took
photos of Abby. I almost felt guilty, like a criminal on the run from jail, and
couldn’t help looking around me in case I got caught. Alex was still at work
and after I splurged I realized we might not have enough money for the bus
home. I had only brought a few dollars with me to the hospital. Luckily Abby
had some money so when we pooled our resources we came up with enough change.
The next
day I gave Abby a break and told her not to come to the hospital with me. She
had a list of things to do before she flew back to San Francisco on Saturday. I
was given a blood test, and my creatinine level was still high. So I was given
two more litres of sodium chloride in water over four hours. I was happy to go
back to four hours instead of two because it was less cold and uncomfortable
going into my vein and my heart didn’t beat so fast. When I finally finished at
about five pm, for the fifth night in a row, I was released to spend the night
in my own bed.
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