I received the dose of melphalan today. I have had no side effects so far but they predicted that the side effects would start in the next few days. They told me the infusion of the chemo would take about 20 minutes so I had predicted to myself that we should be in and out fairly quickly today even though I knew I would have to get a unit of blood. It ended up that I had to get two units of blood and a bag of magnesium. We got there at 8:45 this morning and did not leave until 5 p.m.
It was Reta's birthday today so after we finished, I took her out to eat somewhere that she wanted to go.
Please don't forget to include in your prayers that the chemo I received today will wipe out the myeloma without causing life-threatening side effects. Thank you for your prayers and your comments on the blog.

I saw doctor Van Rhee today and I will explain as best I can what he explained to me. He had the images for the PET scan that was done yesterday. He explained that even though the myeloma markers had gotten better the images when compared to the June 7th images were worse now. I could easily see for myself the images were worse now than they were when we came in early June. Since I have gotten the vdt pace, it should have improved the situation greatly but it had not. The scan showed hot spots all over my body. There are doubts now the high powered melphalan will reduce the myeloma as it should. He said to keep a positive attitude and hope for the best. I will continue on with the stem cell transplant as I had planned before. As I write this we're waiting to get the central line installed so that they can give me infusions of my stem cells. We have waited here for over 3 hours and still have not gotten anything accomplished. I thought I would use this time waiting to catch up on the blog.
My platelet count had gained to 30 today from 29 yesterday. I have mentioned in the blog about my Kappa free light chains going down to about 7 after I got the vdt pace. They have steadily increased to 10 and then 20 and today they were 44. These big increases have been in a short amount of time. This is really not good.
As you can see I really need your prayers in order to stop this awful disease. Thank you.

My platelet count had gone to 29 today from 28 yesterday.
My schedule called for me to get 4 MRIs today with the last one starting at 9:30 tonight. When I went in at 8 a.m to get one of the MRIs this morning, the lady told me that she was going to try to do all four while I was there this morning. She managed to do that and I was so glad that we didn't have to go back tonight. I got the 4 MRIs , blood work and the PET/CT scan this afternoon.
Tomorrow I will have to see Doctor Van Rhee and I will also have to get a CVL line put in. That's also called a central line. The last one of those I got put in, they put it in my neck and I really didn't like getting it put in. Maybe tomorrow will be a more pleasant experience getting it put in.
Just a reminder that Wednesday is when I will be getting the melphalan infusion. They told me today that it would be about 10 days after they are given to me before the stem cells start to make any difference.
Don't get overheated in the hot weather.

We had to go get my blood work done today and my platelet count had gone up from 23 two days ago to 28 today. Of course we were so glad that it was going up.
I have found out that the chemo infusion will last about 30 minutes. I have been told that I won't feel any effects for a few days and then they will be pretty bad. I will have to say I really dread going through this, especially with the risk involved in recovery that I mentioned in an earlier posting.
Tomorrow, my testing starts at 8 a.m.and then we have some big breaks between tests with the last one starting at 9:30 p.m.
I hope everyone has a wonderful Monday.

We didn't have to go to UAMS today so we spent the day relaxing and getting caught up on doing nothing except what we wanted to do. We did watch several episodes of Gunsmoke that was filmed in 1957. We both really enjoy watching Gunsmoke.
The only thing we have tomorrow is to go for Labs at 1 pm. I will be hoping that my platelet counts have gone up from the test yesterday.
I hope everyone's having a really good weekend and staying out of the heat.

The only thing we had to do today as for anything medical was to go and get my blood drawn and tested. After it was drawn and after there was enough time for it to be tested the nurse came back and told me that the platelet count was 13. We were very disappointed and I was also concerned because two days ago it had been 21. I was trying to think what's going to happen now with such a big drop in just two days and how that's going to affect things. How can I possibly recover from a much stronger chemo when I'm not recovering from the past one which is been almost a month ago. The nurse came back into the room and said she had looked at the results wrong instead of being 13 my count was 23. Well we were overjoyed and so relieved. The count did not go up much but it did go up and not go down. This shows I am recovering!
The APN that we saw today is giving us another day off tomorrow so we don't have to go back until Sunday. The extra day off will sure feel good.
Thank you all for the comments. Joanie, my address here is:
Jerry Caldwell
Park Avenue Lofts
Apartment 3113
320 South University Ave
Little Rock, AR
72205

We did not have to go to UAMS today so we took the opportunity to get stocked up on supplies that we will need while we're living in the apartment. It was really hot here today but I won't complain because I know it was really hot there in Northeast Tennessee too. They are forecasting it to get to 97 here tomorrow.
I got my schedule for testing next week and it looks like I'm going to have a very heavy schedule on Monday. My first one starts at 8 in the morning and my last one starts at 9:30 that night.
I won't have any counts to report today so I will report them tomorrow night after I get the tests done. I hope everyone has a nice evening. Thank you all for the real nice comments you left. They are much appreciated.