Bone Marrow Extraction

by Erin Gourley

Bone Marrow Extraction and Labs Begin Tomorrow

So, tomorrow’s a big day. The good news is Lucas’s neutrophils went up to 90 yesterday! Down to 80 today but we’ll take it right? It’s not 200 but maybe tomorrow he will have a jump. Regardless, they are performing the lumber puncture and bone marrow assessment. Brian’s with him now and I’m driving down and will be there when he gets out of the procedure. He’s going in at 10:30am.

I’m praying like I’ve never prayed before that the bone marrow will be clean (they call this MRD negative). We won’t know this for certain until day 10 at the earliest. All we will know after 24 hours of the procedure if the morphological report is MRD positive meaning they see malignant cells visually (not molecularly). They then send the bone marrow cells for a more thorough analysis to confirm it is in fact negative (please God let that be the case). They will prepare for a bone marrow transplant just in case and try to identify a donor who will meet the 10 out of 10 qualifications of being a match. That could be a sibling, family member or not. They do this to be prepared just in case.

After his procedure tomorrow, he will get to come ‘home’ to the new apartment. They want to give him a break before round 2. Jennifer and Corby have been knocking themselves out to get the place ready. And sincere thanks to Michael Lucas for helping with the rest of the furnishings and providing a mover. Dad and Deb will keep the kids and bring him them down Saturday assuming all goes well with Lucas Th pm and Friday. I know this will light up Lucas to see his brother and sister.

Praying for a clean cancer free bone marrow tomorrow. xoxo

Lucas has his Celtic PJs on tonight.

He asked me today, “Dad what time do I go to sleep tomorrow morning?” Because he knows he goes under for the lumbar puncture, spinal chemo and getting his bone marrow sample. They took off his IV for a few minutes today, and the stood up in his bed and jumped all the way across to the couch, giving me a heart attack. I look at him and all I want to do is take this away from him, for him to heal and for God to let him live the life that I know he deserves. Hes just a fighter. Power walking the halls. No dummy, knows everything thats up, hears everything but holds it in. God please bless him tonight, please heal his body and please give him strength tomorrow to go home, MRD negative, infection free and be with his family. -Dad