Orientation day

Today was a long, fact-filled day at the transplant clinic. We met with everyone but the janitor, and our heads are swimming with information. Luckily, most of it is also in writing so that we can sort it out at our own pace. Basically, Lindsey will have her catheter put in this Friday. It will be done outpatient, and she will have three six-inch "lumens" hanging out of her for the next 4 months. Due to her vein issues, she may have to have it in a creative place on her body, but that will be determined by the doctor. The procedure will be done by a radiology interventionist~interesting title for a doctor. . . Then we go back next Tuesday for blood work, and Wednesday will be the first day of her mobilization chemo treatment that will last for 3 days. Part of it is done with a mobile pump that we take home so that she can get the treatment for 24 hours~that was a new development! We met some very nice people in the waiting room: a twenty-something young lady with relapsed Hodgkins who is 10 days out from her stem cell treatment. Her name is Sandra and she and her mother Mona came right up to us and gave us their phone number and Email address so that we could call them anytime for help or advice or whatever! They said that someone did that for them and that it has been very helpful to have someone who is a little bit ahead in the process help you through it. They will be a wonderful resource for us ~ they've just been where we are ! We are looking forward to becoming friends with them, and I'm sure we'll be in touch with them alot during this process. ............. We've been getting lots of calls from friends wanting to help, and there will be many times in the next months when we will be needing it. The folks at the transplant clinic are always telling us to accept help whenever we can so that we don't get exhausted and overwhelmed. Andy and I will be focusing our complete attention on Lindsey's care for the next few months, so there will be plenty of times when we'll need help with cleaning, grocery shopping, meals, etc. Lehua Graham has graciously offered to help schedule folks to clean Lindsey's room, since it will be important to keep everything sanitized as much as possible in there. We've got a cleaning lady coming in once a week to do the whole house, but we'll need some extra help keeping that area of the house extra clean. We'll probably get that up and running in the next few weeks. Several of our wonderful friends have already offered to be on that list, so you'll be hearing from Lehua !