I’ve had a variety of physical complaints for a long time, most of which I’d mentally marked as long-term side effects of the chemo and radiation and transplant and so on.
But recently I’ve started to have very little saliva most of the time. This had been accompanied by the also-not-mouthwatering red dots I was getting on my feet and legs, and the recurring strong pain I would get in my left ankle.
Last week I called my normal doctor and got an appointment for Thursday. On Wednesday I had my normal post-treatment 3-month blood tests. Normally I just an email notification when the results are available. I got a phone call instead. It was from the on-call Urgent Care doctor.
He’d seen my blood test results and said that I needed to hurry to an urgent care clinic to get a platelet transfusion. And to not get cut along the way. Apparently platelet counts are supposed to be at least ~120k per mm3 of blood. Mine were 5k.
That night I had a transfusion. The next day my normal doctor appointment was overridden by Dr Oncologist, who needed to perform a bone marrow biopsy. Then on Friday I got more blood. I was given Saturday off, went in Sunday for more tests, and now on Monday I am back getting more platelets.
Something is causing my blood to be real deficient, but we don’t have any data on what it is just yet. Hopefully we’ll have those bone marrow results soon!