It seems like much has happened since our last email. The weekend of Thanksgiving we made a quick trip to Utah. Both our families knew that I was coming but Quinn and the boys were a complete surprise. I think they liked their surprise! Perhaps the best part of our trip was on our lay-over in Chicago, as we were about to miss our connecting flight, we found out that Jadi, my oldest sister, is a complete bone marrow match!!! Thrilled, happy, elated and grateful don't even begin to describe our feelings! With this good news we will now move quickly toward the transplant. Since the transplant will actually be a bone marrow stem cell transplant, Jadi will come out to North Carolina on Christmas day and the next day begin testing before they can harvest her stem cells. She will undergo about 3 days of treatment to move the stem cells into the peripheral blood, and then it will take 2 days to collect enough stem cells via a centrifuge process for the transplant. So, no extraction of actual bone marrow! I will begin chemotherapy treatment the first week of January as an out patient, and will be admitted to the hospital around the 8th of January for the remaining week of high-dose chemotherapy. After 2 days of rest from the chemotherapy, I will then receive the stem cell transplant. The doctors seem to think that I will be required to be in the hospital for about 30 days following the transplant. As you can imagine, I am not looking forward to being incarcerated for that month, but I have become rather submissive to whatever doctors tell me to do! I am also told that even after being released from the hospital, I will continue to recover at home and possibly not feel too well for some time. I guess that is to be expected when you have cancer, right?
It is possibly a demented thought to be looking forward to something like chemotherapy, but I think we are all anxious to get the whole process started. We will try to keep you posted as we progress through this experience.
Before this, we had never experienced having so many people pray and fast specifically for us. It has been amazing. We really feel that Jadi being a match is a true answer to prayer. Thank you all for your support, love and prayers. We have, in a very real way, felt the sustaining strength beyond our own and it has instilled within us faith, courage, vitality, patience, and energy during this time. We can’t thank you enough for your support.
May you all have a wonderful holiday season. We feel we have much to celebrate and much to reverence.
Thank you again,
Jon and the clan
P.S.
Many people have generously offered to help even by means of being tested as a bone morrow match. We have been blessed to find a match within my family, but thousands of others aren’t quite so fortunate. If you would like more information on how to join the National Marrow Donor Registry, the website is below. It costs $50 to register, but only involves a swab of the cheek from inside the mouth to get the required information (no blood draw needed). As you can imagine, this is something we feel quite passionate about now!
http://www.marrow.org/
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