Day Plus Two-Hundred-Fourteen

Jody has been watching the English Springer Spaniel Rescue site almost weekly, when a couple of days ago a dog named Murphy showed up. During our visit to the clinic last week, Jody again posed the question to Doctor Brunvand as she did back on January 18. "Do you think it will be all right if I had a dog?" Doctor Brunvand again said it was OK. He felt it would be great for Jody. Taking care of a dog will give her lots of exercise and even help to pick up her spirit.



Jody began calling the Rescue and by Thursday we went to meet "Murphy". The Rescue, before Jody could adopt wanted to visit our house and if they felt things were OK they would leave Murphy with us for the weekend. Murphy arrived at our house around 4:30 and immediately moved in. Jody fell instantly in love with him, and he with her (me too). Friday afternoon we took Murphy off for a bath at Petco and by Saturday there was no doubt Murphy was staying.

Here's MURPHY!

Go Figure! We got him a bath on Saturday, then we went to the "Dogie-Park" at old Stappleton. He had a blast running around off his leash with the other dogs. 

Jody and Murphy at the "Dogie-Park"



 He was very well behaved and did not steal any one's ball. Murphy had lots of meet-n-greets, if you know what I mean, but he always returned to Jody.

He knew who to come back to...

 (In case you were wondering, Jody did have a supply of treats in the bag.)


Such a SERIOUS face!

My last post I posted some picture of Jody. I wanted to show everyone how her hair has begun to come back. Jody has a picture of her mom on our dresser that I like a lot and I keep telling her the hairstyle is coming back. What does everyone think? Should Jody go for her Mom's waive or not... Need to hear form you...



Jody's mother circa 1936

The picture above is a picture of her mom, Maxine. It was taken in California when she was 24 years old. I love the curls and the top wave. I think it will look great on Jody.

Jody circa 2011

Like mother like daughter. I love the smile and the expresive eyes.

Day Plus Two-Hundred-Ten

This is Day Plus Two Hundred and Ten and Jody has some fantastic information she would like me to share with everyone. As I mentioned earlier we had a clinic visit with our transplant doctor, Doctor Brunvand on Tuesday this week. We were anxious to find out the results of our Chimerism Lab report. The report showed Jody has fully en graphed with her donors stem cells her T-cells are developing and are over 95-96% her donors. This test is plus or minus 5% so it is as close as you can get to 100%. Her granulocytes, which include Neutrophil, Eosinophil, Basophil granulocytes are at 100% her donor and continue to grow. In addition to this news her CBC came back better than before we began the transplant. Jody's HCT continues to improve along with her hemoglobin. She is back to totally normal with her White Blood cells and platelets. We are both ecstatic!

Today, Jody had a tooth pulled and she did fantastic. It seems one of the side-effects of chemo is it causes Jody to loose layers of enamel on her teeth. Cavities can form quickly. Jody went to her dentist for a check-up and he only found one cavity. It was in one of her rear molars, partially below her gum line and did not have a matching tooth below it. The dentist felt he would have a tough time drilling and filling the decay. He felt it was best to just remove it since it did not serve any function. After consulting with the BMT team on Tuesday everyone felt the risk was low enough to proceed with the extraction. Jody had her appointment today and everything went well. Well almost, she did protest a lot before the tooth was removed, but afterwards she told me it was nothing. Ask her to tell you about the tooth, she wanted to bring it home but the dentist would not allow it, something about a major bio-hazard.

Jody and I wanted to share some pictures with you. The picture below was the two of us at our Valentine's dinner at one of our favorite Mexican restaurants... Notice the margaritas? Trudy and Derek know exactly where it is...



Valentine's dinner... Notice the Necklace! It was her birthday present... I told her she is wearing my heart around her neck.

I wanted to show everyone the progress she has made in growing her hair and I just could not make a choice as to which picture to use, so I used the following three pictures. I hope everyone enjoys them.  

Picture number 1 "Smiling"

I was given strict instructions... No turkey gobble neck this time... I think I succeeded, isn't she pretty? 

Picture number 2 "Chin-up"

Check out all the curly hair... It is known as "Chemo-Curl", she is not sure if she wants to keep it... but she has it for now. The doctors and nurses tell Jody sometimes it last only for a year and sometimes it stays longer. Jody is just happy she has some hair for now. 


Picture number 3 "Looking-up"



Day Plus Two-Hundred

Can you believe how far along Jody has come... Yes we are at Day-plus two-hundred! I have some GREAT news for everyone, but first I wanted to show you how the hair was coming along...

December 2008



 The picture on the left was taken at Christmas time. I gave Jody the "Blue Wave" necklace for Christmas. I bought the necklace when we were in Hawaii for our honeymoon.  



July 2010



The picture to the right was taken at Maggiano's restaurant a few days before we checked into the hospital for the transplant.

The picture below was taken in August about twenty days post transplant. Jody by this time had her full dose of chemo. Jody's hair was falling out in clumps so she decided to let me cut her hair.



August 2010



 The next picture was taken a few weeks ago. This was our first visit with Doctor Brunvand since she had her lungectomy. Doctor Brunvand was excited about her progress.



January 2011



Below we captured the moment together, I was wearing the new hat and bow tie I got for Christmas and Jody was sporting her new hairdo. All smiles!



Jody and I together



Doctor Brunvand and Jody



Doctor Brunvand and Myself



As I mentioned above I have some great news to share with everyone. Jody has continued to improve and she has actually progressed further than she was before the lungectomy surprise. Jody's lungs have improved enough that she does not need oxygen during the day, but as an added precaution we are continuing to use the oxygen at night. The really big news is Jody has been told to she no longer needs to take her daily IV fluids. The doctors have continued to adjust her medication and have even eliminated a couple. Her energy increases daily as her blood counts continue to improve. In July Jody will begin a regiment of vaccines as her immunity system improves. During our last visit the doctors took an extra blood draw to send out for a Chimerism Test to test her engraftment. I will let everyone know the results sometime this week.

This should bring everyone up to date... Feel free to call, visit or write...

Love to everyone!