Ask enough and you shall receive

First of all I want to thank the readers of my blog who continually come back for updates even though I do not always have new ones to share. I also want to apologize for not updating more often. I've never been the kind of person who is able to write just a little at a time, so I seem to put off writing updates because I know it will take a huge chunk of time to do so and can never commit myself to sit down long enough with my laptop and write. I owe it to you all as friends who have offered their support and prayers to me and my family to write more often and give you the updates you come to read. So I'm going to do my best to write at LEAST once a month (a suggestion given by one of my readers) and update you something about what's going on with me. It may not be a long update, but I'll try to at least let you know how my health is holding up at the time. :)

Last I updated I was looking forward to my future sister in-law's wedding, which I was to be her maid of honor with. It turns out that four days before the wedding I got severe hives that covered about 90% of my body and no matter how much benadryl I would take, it would only get worse. After one last attempt of a cold shower to help with the hives and it failing miserably I broke down and had Benito take me to the ER close by. I chose the nearby ER rather than my CF center's ER because I thought it would be a quick in and out visit. They would give me an IV dose of Benadryl and I'd be all fixed! Wrong. I spent four hours in the ER waiting room sat next to someone who was certain he had H1N1 (yes, I wore a mask and didn't touch Anything, but it's still scary to be in a crowded ER waiting room being post transplant!). Once I got taken back to be seen the ER doctor was more concerned with the fact that I had stopped taking an antibiotic that I was [at the time] sure caused the hives and he wanted to find an alternate antibiotic to put me on at 1 in the morning, rather than treating my hives. He called my tx center, which is really not treating me anymore, so they were not sure why they were called. After a few hours he had the nurse push IV Benadryl and an IV form of steroid to help the hives. After she pushed the Benadryl, she immediately pushed the steroid and as soon as she did so, I got a very strange burning and tingling sensation throughout my body. By the time she flushed it through I was having trouble speaking and couldn't lift my arms or legs. I tried to tell her what was wrong, but it took forever to get a single word out. Poor Benito was so worried. The nurse asked Benito if my speech was always like that (even though she and I had been talking to each other perfectly normal minutes ago) and Benito said no, so she went and got the doctor. He didn't know what was going on, so he had me just wait and see if it got better or worse. After three hours my speech was beginning to get better and I was able to move my legs enough to walk with some help. So the doctor decided to discharge me and have me follow up with my doctor the next day. We got home at 5am and by noon my CF nurse called to follow up on the blood draw I had done the morning before (pre ER visit). Aparently my creatinine (kidney function) was at 2.8 (almost 3x my norm). She had spoken to my CF doctor before calling me and he wanted me admitted immediately for acute renal failure. I told her about the night I had in the ER and she said that severe hives is a symptom of renal failure and was disappointed the ER doctor never did any blood work before giving me that large dose of steroid (which causes more strain on the kidneys). So I was admitted into my CF center and hooked up to IV fluids, had a foley cath placed to drain my bladder and had my Prograf held for a few days until my creatinine came down. My Prograf (immunosuppressant medication) level in my blood was at a very toxic level of 30 (my doctors try and keep it from 8-9 at all times, so we figured out that the antibiotic I was put on a week prior had increased the toxicity of the Prograf I was taking (although I did decrease the dose of Prograf I was on as directed by my physician). My levels came down low enough that my doctors allowed me to be discharged the evening before the wedding, so although Benito, his father and I missed the rehearsal and dinner, we were able to be there for the entire day of the wedding! The wedding was beautiful and we all had a wonderful time. I got to meet a lot of Benito's family that I hadn't met yet, so that was a real treat.

Just before being discharged from the hospital, the pulmonologist that had did my eval for transplant came in and saw me and discussed options for me to consider regarding treatments for rejection. He said he personally had experience with both rATG and photopheresis and found them to both be not a sure fix, but he was more comfortable trying photopheresis on me. I have three lingering infections in my lungs that we just can't seem to take charge of, so he didn't think using rATG on me was safe as it would allow the infections to worsen when my immune system dropped. Photopheresis is a procedure in which I would have to get a new central line placed with 2 lines, one that would remove my blood and the other that would place it back into my body. while the blood is out, it will be shown a special kind of light that will kill T-cells and them place the blood back into my body sans T-cells. The treatments will all be out patient, starting twice a week for a while then tapering off slowly. The doctor said we will hopefully see a halt in lung function loss within a month or two and if it seems like it's working we'll continue the treatment for six months. He has only worked with three other patients with photopheresis and these are how they worked: Pt A: halt in lung function decline, but no improvement. Pt B: Pt actually gained 10% of their lung function back and the signs of rejection disappeared. Pt C: Pt continued to lose lung function / photopheresis showed no benefit for this patient. So I'll be his fourth patient he's tried this on and I'm hoping to at least halt the decline, if not get some improvement. Really though, I'd be happy to just not lose any more lung function! Once my insurance approves the treatments I'll have the new line placed and hopefully get started on the photopheresis as soon as possible!

Benito and I had been talking about moving closer to his work (as it is, he's commuting 2hrs a day round trip to work), and with the gas prices on the rise, it's gotten to be so expensive to live so far away from his work. Now with the photophesis treatments in my future, and all the driving I'll be having to do to and from my hospital our decision was made for us; we needed to move asap. We spent a few weeks looking for a place that we were allowed to bring our dog, Roxy and as of a week ago, we've found an apartment 10min away from Benito's work, 25min away from my hospital and they allow Roxy! We'll be getting the keys to the new apartment on the 23rd and it looks like we'll be spending Easter driving a U-Haul packed full of our stuff to our new home in Roseville!