2 Weeks Post Donation

Well, it's been 2 weeks since the donation took place. The area where the line was is still healing... I have a massive bruise in the groin/thigh area and a tiny little scabbed area where they inserted it. I rested up for a couple days then got busy and was on my feet a lot and I noticed some new bruising and swelling so I had to try to stay off my feet and ice the area for a day or two. It's looking much better now though. It's pretty much the coolest looking bruise ever and I wish I could show it off just for fun, but it's probably not socially acceptable to say to someone "hey, wanna see my cool bruise?" then whip off my pants to show them ;)

Anyway, I haven't heard any word from or about the recipient. I guess I am a little disappointed to have not heard anything yet but hopefully I will soon!

Lee will probably give me a call within the next couple of weeks and maybe have an update for me about her and how she is doing. Until then, I hope everyone had a lovely Thanksgiving and aren't stressing out too much this Christmas season... keeping in mind the real meaning behind Christmas :)

Donation Day Details

We got there at 6:30am after not sleeping at all the night before. They took vitals and had me sign some consent forms. They drew some blood to check all of my baseline levels and we had to wait for the results to come back before I could get the last filgrastim injection. In the mean time, the vascular surgeon came in and started to prep me to get the line put in. The process was quick and they used lidocaine to numb the area. They did the entire procedure right at the bedside. It caused a bit of discomfort but it wasn't anything major. There were 2 tubes connected to the line so the entire process was done through that... no needles in my arms all day! That was really nice! Otherwise I wouldn't have been able to move my arms around at all.

My handsome honey being manly carrying my bag 

The blood work came back and I was able to give myself the last filgrastim shot at 8am. Yes, I asked to give myself the shot because I've mastered it over the last 4 days making it completely painless. Per the NMDP, I had to wait 1 hour after the filgrastim injection for the process to begin so that was finally started at 9am. During the process, they want to make sure your blood isn't clotting through the tubes while it's being sent through to the apheresis machine so they use an anticoagulant to avoid that. The anticoagulant they use decreases calcium levels in the body so they give you a calcium drip. Symptoms of decreased calcium include tingling of the lips, possibly fingers, nose or other extremities. Probably 10 minutes in I started to feel my lips tingle a bit so they increased the calcium drip until the tingling subsided.

We were exhausted!

The entire day was just a lot of waiting. I think around noon the lab took a sample of what had been collected so far to see how the sample was looking. They said it was looking good so I hopefully wouldn't have to continue with the collection tomorrow because they were worried about that. One of the nurses told me that my CD34 cells were really high which was a good thing so that was promising. I reeeeeally didn't want to spend the night in the hospital with that line stuck in me all night!  

The apheresis machine

Around 3pm the collection ended and they took samples of the stem cells to send to the lab. From then I had to wait to see if they had gotten what they needed, and if they did, I had to wait 2 hours for the line to be removed. I found out that they got almost twice the number of CD34 cells that they needed so the countdown to 5pm was on! I couldn't wait to get that line out! They took the line out at 5 and the nurse had to put pressure on it for 30 minutes. The nurse literally sat at my bedside and put pressure on my groin area for a half hour... we had a fun conversation lol. The protocol at the hospital was to treat the vein as an artery; since they weren't stitching it shut, that meant the 30 minutes of pressure, and after that I had to leave a 5lb sandbag on the area for an hour. It stopped bleeding almost right away but I had to wait anyway. An hour and a half after the line was removed I was able to get up and walk around and they wanted to make sure the clot held while I moved around. They patched it up with some gauze and tape and by 7pm they wheeled me downstairs while my lovely boyfriend got the car and we were able to go home. The second the nurses walked in at that 1 hour mark for the sandbag I started taking the sandbag off and the gauze and popped right up out of bed because I was so eager to leave (and also go to the bathroom!)

Lee checked in with me a few times during the collection to see how I was doing. He was there for me through the entire thing and everyone involved was absolutely wonderful! The stem cells were being flown out with the curriur this morning (Friday). Hopefully once she receives the transplant he'll let me know and keep me up to date so then I can keep the blog up to date!

Yesterday was certainly a very long day! But I feel awesome today! The side-effects have been gone since Wednesday evening (day 4 of the filgrastim) so that was certainly really helpful so I wasn't aching all day during the collection. I honestly feel completely back to myself aside from the slight pain and tenderness from where the line was.

My cells!

I sent this picture to a friend of mine and she replied: "amazing to think there's someones future in that bag." That really made me think. This could save someones life. We forget how delicate and precious our lives are until we fear we might not have another day. I'm so honored to have been given the opportunity to do this... and how easy it was for me to do it. Sure, it took time out of my life, but it was worth it and I'd do it again in a heart beat.

Donation Day!

The day is going well. We arrived around 6:30am and they drew some blood to check my white counts. I gave myself the last injection around 8am and then we had to wait an hour before the collection could start. They put a line in my femoral vein and the process was kind of uncomfortable. The doctor used lidocaine to numb the area and they did it right in my hospital bed. I was totally fine with everything until I started to feel blood trickle down my leg and I started to get a little light headed. I don't do blood well. It feels like a weird pressure in my groin area but it's nice to be able to move both arms. 

The side-effects are completely gone and I'm so thankful for that because it would make sitting here even more uncomfortable. 

We are hoping they get a full collection today so I don't have to stay until tomorrow and it should be ending around 3:30pm. The line has to stay in for 2 more hours after the collection and then once they remove it I have to wait around for another couple of hours to be monitored but then I can go home hopefully. :)

Let's get physical!

Friday was the big day! Well, one of the big days.

I went to the hospital to have the physical done. I got there and got to meet the doctor and she talked to me a little bit about the process. She asked me a lot of questions pertaining to my health and she took a thorough health history. After all of the questions, they drew more blood. They took 9 tubes, 2 of those tubes were going to be sent out and stored for that one consent form that I signed allowing them to do so. They told me that the recipients get so much more blood drawn though... something like 12 tubes. Crazy. I think this was a repeat infectious disease test because they wanted to make sure I didn't contract anything since I had the test done before.

The doctor looked at my veins briefly and then had the apheresis nurse, who would be putting the needles in, take a look as well and they both seemed to think that a line in the femoral vein would be best because I have such small veins. This isn't something I'm really crazy about doing but it will probably be better. On the day of the donation, I'll receive my last shot of filgrastim in the morning, then they have to wait an hour before doing the donation after the injection so between the shot and the wait, a vascular surgeon will insert the line. Like I said, I'm really not crazy about the idea, but it is what it is. At least with this, I won't have needles in my arms.

After the blood was drawn, I got an EKG. It took longer to put the leads on than to do the actual EKG itself so the girl that was putting the leads on chatted with me for a while. I'm guessing she knew I was a donor when she looked at my chart so she started talking about it and said how awesome it was. I can't remember how it came up, but she didn't know that I don't actually know the recipient so when she found this out she thought it was the greatest thing. She kept thanking me for what I was doing and the doctor thanked me as well. I wasn't quite sure how to respond because I'm not doing it to get recognition or thank yous, I'm doing it so this woman can have another chance at life... another chance at having a family, a chance to reconcile relationships, a chance at doing something she always wanted to do but never did... like traveling or learning another language. I'm doing it because it's the right thing to do and it's something that I hope someone else would be willing to do for me if I needed it. It was hard to know what to say to that.

Anyway, after the EKG, I went and received a chest x-ray. That didn't take very long either. I was supposed to go and see where I'd be doing the donation but it was already so late in the day by the time I had finished with everything so I didn't get to see it. I figure that I'll be spending a good 6-8 hours there in a few weeks so I'll get a really good look at it then. :p

Once the day was coming to a close, I received a phone call from Lee. He was checking on me to see how the day had gone and how everything else was going. I have to say that they have been so awesome at the NMDP and they have been there every step of the way.

Before I end this tonight, I'm curious how other donors have responded to these thanks and what their reasons for signing up to be a donor were/are. Please share your experiences and responses, I'd really love to hear them!