Finally I Hear Percentages In My FAVOR!!

There are different ways to treat leukemia based on the type of leukemia that you have.

• Chemo Only
• Transplant- You are your own donor
• Transplant- Related Donor
• Transplant- Unrelated Donor - Most risky

My sister, Dana was tested but she was not close enough of a match. I have to hand it to my sister because she absolutely HATES needles or shots and she did not hesitate to get tested to see if she was a match for me. So the first time around I was my own donor. At the time I was told that the chances of beating the leukemia where I was my own donor was 40% to 50%. That kind of stinks I think. If you go through all of this treatment I was hoping to 80% to 90%. Unfortunately with my type of leukemia it is what is.

When the leukemia came out of remission for a cameo appearance back in October I went through the chemo session again with a slightly different regimen of drugs and did an unrelated donor transplant. Again I was told the percentages of this working and the numbers are not good. It is somewhere around 35% to 45%. Again I would have liked to hear some higher numbers but it is what is. I can't change that so let's move on down the road.

I do have some things going FOR me that ups my percentages. My age and physical condition going into treatment plays a huge part. The reason the percentages are so low is that typically the type of leukemia I have shows up in people in their teens and then does not show up until people are in their 50's and 60's. The treatment is pretty rough and what can happen is as people are older their bodies cannot take the treatment. The doctors have to take the people off of chemo because it could kill them. Then what happens is the leukemia gets them.

I have been very fortunate during treatment. I handled all of the chemo very well. Don't get me wrong. I had some low days but overall it went well. The fact that I handled the treatment TWICE is a good sign.

As I have mentioned in previous blogs I have been having some Graf vs. Host pop up. Again, this is where your body is recognizing these foreign cells and is trying to work with them to keep the leukemia from coming back.

YESTERDAY I learned that of the people who have been cured of leukemia 80% to 90% had some graf vs. host.

FINALLY a percentage in my favor.