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Mags,

I don’t know a lot about my bone marrow biopsy results because it was determined that we would wait until after Nathan was born before doing anything, and then my blood came back to normal 8-9 months after delivery. I do know that the hematologist said that I didn’t have chromosome changes. I have definitely been trying to stay well this time, although it’s been tough. My white counts are normal, but my platelets are my main issue (at least they were last pregnancy). They stayed in the 40-50 range during the second trimester, and in the 20-30 range during the third trimester. I know that sounds really high compared to some, but I lost 16 points(?) during delivery last time, and that was after they brought me from a 20 to a 99 with four bags of platelets. My oncologist also seems concerned about how my MCV (I think it is) — the size of the red blood cells — increases, and on the lab reports, if there are 20 items, 13-15 of them are abnormal.

I love my oncologist, but I will definitely talk to him about raising the number at which he does a hemoglobin transfusion. It wasn’t too bad last time when I could go home from school and just relax, but now I have to tend to and keep up with Nathan, so that’s taking more of a toll on me. 🙂 I have another blood draw on the 20th and will see my oncologist then, so hopefully I’ll find out some more answers. He said that he was going to call the hematologist to see what she has to say about what my blood is doing this time around. Thanks for the response and the concern.

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I am so glad to hear that the transplant went well. I will pray for an uneventful and successful recovery.

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I was diagnosed in April at the age of 26 with no prior related illness. I don’t know much about my situation and treatment options yet as the doctors are waiting until the baby is born to do anything other than transfusions when my platelets go below 20. My oncologist seems to think that my best bet considering my age would be to do some type of chemotherapy, possibly looking into a bone marrow transplant, but he’s going to have me go back to the university hematologist 3-4 weeks after the baby is born to look into things further.

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Thank y’all for the encouraging words, quotes, and thoughts. I’m doing some better today, and I am going to try harder to be positive and have faith. It’s not the easiest thing to do, but it helps to know that I’m not alone and that when I have questions, I have somewhere I can come to to ask them. And it really helps to see that others are dealing with and surviving this diagnosis.

Now to answer some of *your* questions. EDD stands for expected due date; I wasn’t really sure what to put in my signature at this point since I don’t have a specific type or meds yet. It’s a boy, and we’re planning on calling him Nathan. I’m kinda nervous about the birth because of the possibility of bleeding to death (if I don’t get a transfusion in time) and because if my platelets aren’t above 100, I don’t have the options of pain meds.

My count as of this past Monday was platelets 44 and hemoglobin 8.5. Last Wednesday, the count was platelets 19 and hemoglobin 8.2. My hemoglobin came up on its own; my platelets came up because of the unit of platelets I received in a transfusion on Friday. I’m going in to my oncologist’s office weekly for a CBC and a cross and type (complete with the pretty pink bracelet — do guys get blue ones?) to see if I need another transfusion.

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