Bone Marrow Update

I know I've blogged on this before back in 2008... To bring a few of you up to date... A few years ago, I signed up to be a bone marrow donor. I had a friend with a sick child and they needed a bone marrow transplant. Being a Mom myself, I signed up just to try...

Well, 3 years later, I get a call that I am match. :) I went through extensive blood work in October to be screened. In order to truly match someone you must match so many strands of DNA or there is too high a risk of rejection. I received a letter in January that I did indeed match my recipient, but he/she was too sick at the time to receive a transplant. :(

Well, today... I got a call. :) The recipient is ready, and I am the ideal match! So what does this mean? Well, first it means trying to figure out who will watch my children (we are one man down in our house already). So I am frantically trying to get that squared away. The Bone Marrow people are wonderful!!! They will pay for everything, but having little experience finding childcare they are working their end I am working mine. :) So we will see.

Physically, it is going to require extensive psychological checks to make sure I really know what I am about to get into. Then there is more blood work and a physical. All of these I can do here or close to here. If all goes well and they don't find anything wrong with me... I will be flown to DC to donate stem cells.

I am a tiny bit lucky... The recipient needs PBSC rather than the typical bone marrow extracted from the hip bone. The process is a lot like platelet donations... I would be injected with a hormone that would increase my white cell count and increase the amount of stem cells found in my blood. Then, I would go in to have a platelet type procedure where they withdraw from one arm and put back in the other arm. It would be about 6 hours of cycling the blood. Recovery is pretty quickly (usually a couple of days w/ full recovery in a few weeks).

Oh I am soooo nervous and have no idea what to do... It isn't like I can call M and say he guess what??? Crazy...

I highly recommend people register... DoD Bone Marrow program or the National Bone Marrow Donation

I still don't know what I will be able to do??? I guess I will be praying hard! Please include me and the recipient in your prayers.