Another kink in the road.

First knew about this 2 weeks ago but held back saying anything until I talked to the Oncologist and wondered about the next steps. Seems the protein count in my last biopsy went up rather than down. It's now 30% rather than the 15 it was a month ago. It seems that those two cycles of "treatment " (read chemotherapy) didn't do much of a job. They want the value to be 10% or less. Also they are concerned about the heart issue. The cardiologist thinks things are OK but the transplant team isn't so sure. It's odd as the transplant folks thought other than the water weight things were OK but my cardiologist didn't go along with that. Now that the cardiologist thinks things are OK the transplant team is worried, odd! Anyhow the transplant folks want to wait a couple of weeks to see how the heart does ( the rate is reasonable and fairly steady right now) and figure out a new treatment (read Cchemo) program to get the protein # down. So currently I'm on hold and the transplant is off the table for the time beeing. That does mean I'll get to go to my friend Vin's 90th birthday party next month and probably get to do Thomas again!🚂😃 

Another surprise step.

JShould have known that no trip to the hospital is simple. What started out as a visit to shed some water weight (very successful BTW,) got the cardiologist wondering why I had gained the weight. An angiogram revealed that I had one heart valve that had shrunk in size and was restricting blood flow. So on Thursday we scheduled a Valvularplastly where they use a balloon inserted into the heart to open up the valve. Then overnight in the ICU and home on Friday.

Another surprise is that they gave me a "LIFE VEST" to wear. It is basically a wearable external AED. The Dr. Doesn't really think it's that necessary but thought it's a good idea until we get things settled down. Doubt that I could get through an airport with this on. Looks like a suiside bomber's outfit.

The several Dr.s appointments this week have just been follow ups, nothing new. Meanwhile we await the biopsy results to see what we'll do about rescheduling the transplant. Did get the 2 fillings taken care of though!

Posted 6/11