Every two weeks, on the day before chemo, I go in for a blood draw. Today is the last one!

Yes, it’s possible that I may have to go in again before we see the doctor in two weeks, but still, it feels like a milestone.

One of the cool things about getting results online is that I can see all of the results going back. There is even a function to make a graph:

The first point on the graph was the blood draw that I had after my first meeting with Dr. Dodge, September 13th. That was he uttered the words that I’ll never forget “I don’t see any reason to sugar coat this: I believe you non-Hodgkin’s Lymphoma” (HA! Joke was on him, he was WRONG it was Hodgkin’s!). Before leaving the office he sent me for a blood draw, my white blood cell (WBC) count was 13.2, the “standard range” for WBC’s is between 4.0 – 10.7. (fun fact: the numbers are in K/ul which I believe stands for “Thousand per Unit”)

The second point on the graph was the blood draw that I had before my first chemo and it came in at a respectable 10.7. Then, well, you can see for yourself how I reacted to my first chemo treatment, 2 weeks later I my WBC had RECOVERED all the way back up to 1.5.

From then on I began taking the injections, and you can see from the chart that from then on my WBC generally hovered around the low end of what a normal count should be.

The shots SUCKED. I hated having to do them. But they worked.

Anyway, I just thought the graph was neat. It’s one way to have documented the journey.

OH, and Happy Anniversary to my parents. 37 years!