Transplant Number 2! (Day 0)

Today was Cameron's second transplant.  In the hospital, they call it his re-birthday because all his cancer infected cells and bone marrow have been destroyed by the extremely high doses of chemotherapy and have now been replaced with fresh, shiny new cells, hopefully giving him a second chance at a cancer-free life.

Leading up to today has been a really easy week for us.  Cameron has been in high spirits most of the week and was minimally affected by the chemo side-effects.  In fact, he has only thrown up twice from the chemo.  Usually, Cameron gets VERY nauseated from the chemotherapy - especially the platinum based ones (which is one of the 3 he had this week), but for some reason, this time he has been fine.

Until today, of course.  Cameron is clearly starting to feel the effects of having his bone marrow annihilated.  He slept for about 80% of the day, only waking to find his teddy-bear or if we changed his diaper.  His mouth sores appeared almost over night and he has completely stopped eating.  Although he doesn't have a fever yet, they doctors have decided to draw blood cultures and start him on antibiotics just to make sure, because he clearly feels awful.

The has been put on full intravenous feedings and a constant drip of morphine to keep his pain under control.  His blood pressure started to get a bit high after his transplant, which is usually a side effect of the preservative that they use in the stem cells.  Because it is a common side effect, Cameron was monitored closely and his blood pressure was taken every few minutes.  His blood pressure eventually got to the point where it was necessary to give him medication to bring it down.  Thankfully, the medication worked and his blood pressure was stabilized quite quickly.

So now the waiting game begins.  We have to wait for his counts to come back up and for his immune system to start working again, and in the mean time we have to do everything we can to make sure he doesn't get sick.  This is the terrifying part.  This is the part where none of us slept last time.  But deep down, I know he'll be fine, I just hope that the rest of our stay here is as uneventful as possible.