White Blood Cells Finally Coming Back

My recent stay in the hospital was thankfully brief. Several cultures were taken, but none grew anything of concern. My temperature stayed low enough today and I got enough of my white blood cells back that I was discharged before dinnertime. Hopefully any future hospitalizations for fever and low white blood cell counts are few and brief. My nurse today told me that she's seen ones that last over a week because it's a bad infection or the patient's white blood cell counts just are taking forever to recover.

This time around felt much less confining than the last time around. Of course, not having to recover from surgery was a big help. I initially felt nauseous from the illness, but those same meds that served me so well when I had chemo nausea changed that quickly, giving me a huge appetite. That changed my mood quickly because there's nothing like that to make you feel like you're not on chemo instead of on it. Then, there was the welcome change of once again having some ability to walk. I had the test socket with me, and was able to get some more practice in with it. A physical therapist came in one day and showed me some very useful exercises that were able to get me to start, though currently for very short periods of time, exclusively putting weight on the fake leg. I can now walk comfortably with one crutch as well; this enables me to pull along the IV stand I'm connected to like all the patients with two good legs are able to do. Mobility! Here is a video of me doing the IV pull in the hallway. Narrating is my lovely fiancee who is here visiting during Spring Break. As bald as I look here, believe it or not, I have a number of hairs still remaining! I lost most of my head and facial hair during my first cycle, but after losing some more during the second cycle, the hair loss has stabilized, at least for the moment.