Had the bone marrow biopsy today, not so bad... Back on October 23rd I had a colonoscopy. A polyp and an area of mucosal tissue was found that she thought could be suspect. The polyp was removed and a part of the tissue were removed for biopsy. As it turns out these both have lymphoma involvement. When I talked to the doctor today, he said often there are MANY polyps in the colon, I only had the one polyp and one area of tissue. This is a good thing and will be taken care of with the treatment. As for the treatment... The transplant people wanted to know the results of the bone marrow biopsy before making any decisions regarding which direction to go for treatment. The full results for the bone marrow testing take about a week, but the doc was going to call the transplant people today to get the ball rolling. My doc has been in contact with the team at University of Pennsylvania, so it looks like that's where the transplant will be done. Right now it looks like treatment will probably start in early December, but all that will be finalized once the b.m. biopsy results are back and the HUP docs and mine confer on the best course for me. He said that being a young person with this (usually people over 65) and it not being aggressive, there are a lot more treatment options available for me and he wants to make sure we don't do something now that could affect a treatment option later. He wants to have the whole plan, not just "let's do *this* now and see what happens". As for the bone marrow biopsy itself, relatively painless. the worst pain of all was the anesthetic... THAT SHIT BURNS, then it goes away. I made him earn his money this morning, he said I have hard bones and he really had to work to get the biopsy needle through the bone and into the marrow. I asked if having hard bones was good or bad, he said it was good, they are stronger. There were definitely some weird sensations during the procedure, but no pain to speak of. If he asked me once, he asked 157 times if I had any pain! It was almost to the point of asking him to stop asking, but I knew he was just looking out for me. He explained EVERYTHING he was doing, there were no surprises. Both the assistants said he was very good and very thorough, and the one DID warn me I would be asked every 5 seconds how I was doing - they were right! So now I wait for the HUP team to call and for the results to get to the doctors. I guess I'll be home for Thanksgiving, maybe even get in hunting season while they work up a plan and get things scheduled. Thanks once again for all the thoughts, prayers, texts and messages!!! Y'all are the best!!! Be Safe, Be PRepared, God Bless!! Ed |