Double Good News

An update on Rosalind
As mentioned before Roz's transplant was a success and she is now well over one year afterwards. She has had one prolonged issue - all but one type of blood cell has been 100% from her donor - which is great. The other type, CD3 lymphocytes, has been up and down. This has now had several chimerism blood tests in a row which has shown the percentage of donor cells taking over - and has gone from ~20% to 47% and now up to 69% donor. We are still waiting for the results of her latest bone marrow tests.
What this means is that the likelihood of having to have a bout of chemo and another top-up is very very low..
All being well she has been told that she may not need another topup.

In addition, Roz has just got some adult teaching work nearby for adult art work - felting initially. So she is very pleased.

An update on Richard
I have recovered better from my chemo than this time than all previous 6 bouts. For example I have a blood test on the Friday following the Tuesday of the last injection. In the past my nutrophils are then typically well below .5 - i.e. very nutroponic. This then means I have to be especially careful about catching things for another week or so when the count has gone back over 1. This time the nutrophil count was already over 1. I also feel a lot better and with more energy - so I have been doing a lot more work on the farm and other things. I even passed my mini digger test - I passed originally over 5 years ago and this was a retest. I use the digger on the farm to keep tracks clear, dig drainage channels, prepare before fencing contractors put posts up, cast up after hedge laying etc. Its one of the jobs I can still do, as it does not involve hay and straw dust, and can be done from the cab in damp weather that keeps normal dust levels down

A Happy and Healthy year to you all

We had a lovely Christmas break. The whole family came to our place, and Roz and I were in good enough state to have a great time, eat lots and even have a few drinks - although niether of us can drink very much these days. So the trick is to drink a little of something VERY nice.

Then Roz had us and a few of her close friends around for New Year, when there was much sillyness on the WII - and again much food, drink and laughter

I had clinic last week, and got the go ahead for another course starting today.

It was very amusing. Roz had to go in for a bone marrow biopsy and chemerism blood test, and I had to start my AZT chemo after another blood test - as this week they will carefully monitor my liver, which can be hit hard by AZT. We were two out of the total number of five patients they had in the ward during the whole afternoon - it is normally heaving, with long delays. Several of the NHS staff had not realised this father / daughter link, and being treated simultaneously for the same thing is very weird even for these hardened (but lovely) professionals

On the bad side - we found out today from her mum that a young patient that we got to know very well is losing her battle. Roz and I have a lot to be grateful for.