Day +187-Day +189

4/12/16-Our doctor only has clinic in the afternoon today so we are here at a weird time.  Our blood draw was at 11:45am and we ASSumed our clinic visit (can you see where this is going) an hour later, like it has been since the beginning of time.  After Steven's blood draw he checked into clinic.  The receptionist says, "wow, your clinic visit isn't until 3pm."  I said, no chance, and continued with, "our clinic visits are an hour after the blood draw since we have been coming here, I don't think our doctor wants us to wait for 3 hours,  if our clinic visit was at 3pm why did I need to be here at 11:45......blah blah blah".  By then she was making a phone call and I believe we will be seen in an hour.

Steven is not vain by any means, but he hasn't weathered the loss of his hair well.  It is really filling in great, same color and straight like before.  It's soft, like a newborns!  Interestingly it is growing in uneven and we made a stop at the Positive Image Department.  We spoke to them about his hair and they immediately trimmed it up.  We can go as often as necessary, no charge.  They also have wigs, scarves, hats, makeup and other items that are helpful when patients are dealing with the effects of chemotherapy.  COH thinks of everything.  They are also the people who came to Steven when he was admitted and shaved his head when his hair started falling out.  We were impressed with this from the beginning.  They not only treat the disease, but everything else in-between.  I can't think of one thing that we would need that isn't addressed on campus.  Steven looks so much better, even his coloring is coming back.  It just validates again that we made the right decision to come here.

Back to the clinic visit....
His hemoglobin is holding at 9 g/dl, no blood.  It's been 6 weeks since he has had a unit.  The good news is his blood type has fully converted to A+...finally!  We suspect there is still some stubborn Swede anti-A floating around but Steven's bone marrow is finally making red cells.  No clinic visit next week...our evil plan is working!