Health Update

Dear friends, you must have noticed the steadfast march of my WBCs towards a higher respectable number. In 9 days or so they have risen from mere 700 to a healthier 1700. In these 1700 WBCs the percentage of infection-fighting WBCs is also healthy.

Seeing this ascent doctors made a few changes in my day-to-day medicines. One of the antibiotics was stopped. Also, the WBCs inducing injection was stopped on Saturday. All of us will wait for the complete blood report (hemogram) on Monday with a bated breath. How will my body react to the absence of WBCs inducing injection? Will it continue its upward march nonchalantly or would it collapse like a castle made of out playing cards? My inner voice tells me the result would be the former.

Platelets violent rise and fall is the effect of transfusion and then donor's cells eventually dying. Though my doctor feels that my own platelets have resumed their manufacturing process.

Lastly, the counts table on the right of this blog post is accompanied by another table below it called "Transfusion Dates". This table will give the dates of the last platelet and blood transfusion. Thanks to my friend, Kaushik, maintaining the tabular data has become a lot easier. Thanks Kaushik!

Sunday is going to be uneventful. No trips to the hospital and no transfusions. And I am not complaining :).

Farewell Dear Father-in-law

Thursday turned out to be a day of sorrow for our family. Surbhi's father left for heavenly abode leaving us all in tears. His general health had deteriorated in past few months and God thought this was the time to call His virtuous son back to His home.

My only regret is that He didn't give me enough time to be in his company. There was so much to learn from his simple lifestyle. Surbhi and I spent first three years after marriage in US and we saw very little of our family in those years. When we came back his health had already started deteriorating. He could hardly speak. A man who was so active and could walk miles together tirelessly had trouble walking. But even in the midst of all these hardships I have never seen him lose his composure. His face was serene despite weakness and severe restriction in diet and mobility. Even in this weakened state he would unfailingly do the morning and evening pujas and other day-to-day activities. He never succumbed to his physical weakness.

He has taught me how to lead a simple life far away from all worldly pleasures, how to be softspoken and live for others.

I feel he is still very much here with all of us. I will get a glimpse of him every time I am with Surbhi and with all his wonderful family members who are laden with all the virtues of his.

We will miss you dearly, Papa.

Blood Counts At a Glance

Since I didn't want to bore you any further with my dramatic descriptions of the turbulent rise and fall of my blood counts I thought I would find another simpler way to share them with you. If you look on the top right hand side of this blog post you will notice a new section called "Latest Counts". The table compares the previous report's counts (the "Was" column) with the current report's counts (the "Is" column). At the end of the table you will find the date on which the counts were last updated. Here's hoping that this makes staying up-to-date with my most recent report easier.

I might still bore you with dramatic write-ups but I think going forward blood counts will not be a subject of such write-ups, unless of course I cannot contain my excitement regarding most recent report and I have to share it with you. :)

WBCs Drop a Little

Today's report told me that WBCs have dropped from 1300 to 900. Platelets are also living on the edge at 2000 (a healthy person roughly has platelets in the range of 150,000 up to 450,000 platelets ). So it looks like I will have my third platelet transfusion in span of 5 days.

Am I taken aback by the drop of WBCs? Not at all! Drop has happened in past during my chemo cycles as well. So I was mentally prepared for this. You know how sometimes when you have to jump over a short wall you realize that you are too close to the wall. So you move backwards so that you have enough speed to make the jump of the right height. Probably that is what my WBCs intend doing :).

I will have more updates for all of you tomorrow. Till then, all you good people, keep me in your prayers and hope for the best. I am cheerful and not at all affected by this downward slide. :)

Wind in the Willows

This is perhaps the first book review that I am writing. And aptly, just like my book reviewing experience, which is still in its infancy, I chose a children's book for review. When my good friend Rajesh lent me his copy of "Wind in the Willows" he told me that I will enjoy reading the book not just because it has been written so well but also because it is allegorical. And how right he was!

You know how some books leave that lingering feeling of joy and sadness after you have read them. You feel sad because a wonderful story has come to an end and there are no more pages to turn. And you have read everything there was in the book, including foreword and afterword. This book was such. Kenneth Grahame takes you in a world far away from ours where there is no deceit, cunningness, rivalry etc. The inhabitants of the riverside - Mole, Ratty, Badger and Toady - live in harmony devoid of all negative things in life. It is a tale of all the adventures (and misadventures) they have. In my opinion this is by no means a book for kids. Kenneth's narration is bejeweled with fine language constructs that only a grown-up would relish. Kenneth paints such a beautiful picture of the riverside, the woods and the day-to-day lives of the forest dwellers that it makes you yearn to find such a place.

I read this edition of the book. While there might be many other editions with more beautiful illustrations I liked this edition because its afterword by David Stuart Davies gives you a peek into the life of Kenneth Grahame, which probably influenced him to write such a wonderful tale.

So go ahead and read the book :).

1300!

And now you all know what I am talking about. Yes, it's the WBC count! I am still preening my body for the wonderful outcome :).

Platelets, however, have plummeted from 30,000-ish to 2000, even after receiving a transfusion last Saturday. But I am patient with my platelets. I know that they take time to uncurl themselves and grow and that they have a shorter lifespan than the other cells. So I am not all worried and am willing to wait.

So let's celebrate WBCs' entry into 4-figure land and keep rooting for them till they are ready to function with full gusto :).

Couple of Good News!

Well well well. Believe it or not I am sending this blog post from home from my comfy bedroom and through my zipping fast broadband connection. I got discharged on July 31st at around 6 pm. It wasn't the quite the kind of discharge we had scripted mentally but who is complaining? :) We wanted the counts to soar to a respectable level and then head home. Instead God had other idea in mind. He decided to reverse the order probably because I pressurized Him to be at home for Raksha Bandhan and this was the only way He could let me have the cake and eat it too at such a short notice. It goes without saying that I am elated by this new development and so are all in my family. So how did this all happen? Well He always finds a messenger to start working on your wish. This time it was Sandipbhai. Sandipbhai told us why we couldn't request doctors to discharge me given that counts were continuing to not go beyond 700. We could: 1) make sure that the surroundings at home are safe enough for my recuperation and 2) make visit to hospital whenever doctor wants us to for procedures that cannot be done at home? By doing this not only would I feel a lot better by being at home but we would also cut down drastically on daily cost of the private ward. We bit the bullet and asked this question to our doctor. His response was positive. We could work out an amicable solution so that I can have best of both worlds and I got discharged on the very same day when we proposed this. Isn't it wonderful?!

Good news number 2. After having spent little more than 12 hours at home my WBC count rose by 100! Skeptics might say just it is just 100 but I am so happy with my body's response. Over 10 days of stagnation at 700 has been broken and I feel it will rise steadily now. What made this happen? Change of antibiotics? Change of WBC inducing injection? My return to home? Your prayers? The self talk which I had with my body the other day? I don't know but I would like to believe a concoction of all of the above. I have got to continue having these self talks with my body and making sure that I make the most of my home stay. I am pinning my hopes on counts being at a respectable level on Raksha Bandhan. Wish me luck :).