[Bettyjo]

New & Green to this group

by Bettyjo on Fri Sep 30, 2011 12:19 am

Hi this is BJ in Southern Indiana and I was diagnosed in February 2009 in Louisville KY, following which we attended a Support Group in Louisville which was encouraging. We went to Vanderbilt Ingram Cancer Center in Nashville and decided to pursue an autologous stem cell transplant there which happened on October 23, 2009. In April 2010 my local hematologist informed me that I had relapsed so we went to Indianapolis for an opinion from Dr. Abonour's team and saw Dr. "S" a myeloma dr. She concurred with Dr. Malik's recommendation and in August I began chemo (unfortunately both recommended DVD to include Doxil which they cannot obtain) so I take dexamethasone and subQ Velcade and 10 mg. Revlimid. My counts are declining but we are still scared to death of what the future holds and unsure about another transplant at my age. By the way I had lots of stem cells (re-today's article) and completed my harvest in one day. They said I was an overachiever and there is a stored for another transplant so today's article was encouraging. We stay busy and I do yoga and water exercises at the YMCA.