Hi Lori!
Thanks for checking in. Well, we had a great visit at MD Anderson. They recommend we stay in Chicago for the transplant which I am very relieved with.
They also agreed with the treatment path this far with a little difference of opinion about treatment between now and transplant. The transplant doc down there strongly encourages continuing chemo until just before transplant. We reported this to our team at NW and they are going to consider this and let us know their thoughts. He is currently due to end cycle 3 on May 5. The projected admission date is June 5. So there is a month in between which is good for allowing his counts to rise but the concern would be whether the cancer has time to rebound. He will have another biopsy May 14 so we’ll know more about how complete his remission is at that point. His last biopsy showed great improvement with minimum residual disease except for a small percentage of one of the mutations.

We received great news today that his donor and his medical center have agreed to the end of May stem cell collection! The only hurdle left is the clearance portion of the donor’s testing. We’ll know more about that on May 22. Plus we are working extra hard to keep my husband healthy and safe with his low immunity. His energy is good and we are happy to have a clearer path. The doc at MD Anderson gave us hope as well, which is everything.
I’m feeling exhausted from all of this and am working on building up my strength for the long haul. We are hoping we can take a little time away together before he is admitted.

Hope you are doing well, enjoying the beautiful blooms all around us and looking forward to summer.

I’ll keep you posted as things progress.

Thank you,
Mary