The best present
As A child growing up I remember being asked multiple times, "what do u want for your birthday?" and "what do you want for Xmas?" Because my birthday is 8 days before Xmas, as I got older, the question pretty much became "what do u want for your birthday and Xmas?" When your younger these questions are quite simple, you have your list to Santa, you have the big toy book, and the endless commercials. However as you get older the answer to these questions get more difficult, you don't want to be rude and say money or gift card, so my answer always is either I don't need anything, or I don't know. I have never really liked getting gifts and I still don't, I appreciate them and all the thought that goes into them however I don't need anything. I do enjoy giving presents though, and in the past I have given some pretty great gifts. When you were younger you always enjoyed getting toys and playing with them and then you would get bored and want some other toy. As an adult the best gifts are those that are outside the box, the ones that can make a giant difference in someone's life. These are the gifts that are thought through, the ones that can be kept for a long time.
I do want to reiterate that I do appreciate and love any and every gift I have been given, some more then others:) Sorry about the furby mom, but he deserved a chance to fly even if the flight was out my window. And after I got my first coach purse and my first Pandora bracelet, I began to love pricier gifts.
In college one of my really good friends from home was coming to my school to celebrate my birthday and he had kept asking me what I wanted and I told him I didn't want anything, his visit was enough. This was at the beginning of my journey and I had just started receiving IVIG ( basically my immune system, formed from many blood donors.), a month before. When he got there he handed me a card and I put it aside for later when I could read it. After a great birthday and everyone else had passed out, I opened the card and what was in it caught me off guard. I don't remember exactly what it looked like but basically it was a piece of paper that was from the American Red Cross and it said the above person has donated blood in your name to the blood bank. Sure a tablet, an iphone, or a coach purse are nice to have and show off but in the event of an emergency can they save your life?
Although this was such a long time ago a recent Dana Farber visit made me remember it very clear. Again a reminder, this blog is for awareness and in no way am I begging or even asking for your blood. The number one reason people don't donate blood is because they just never thought about it, never had a reason to. Before I really got sick, I had a similar thought process, but now that I require the help of donors to live I did a little research. When I was looking at the American Red cross blood center homepage some of the statistics and information were shocking to me. I am sure that most "healthy" people do not even know their blood type and have never had it checked, Because when I too was " healthy" I never even thought about my blood type. However now I have a card that I am suppose to have in my wallet at all times and my medical bracelet should read O-. I am not going to turn this into a lesson on blood donating but I just wanted to share 2 statistics that relate to me and my last Dana Farber day.
#1 the most common type of blood is O-, great demand and short supplied.
#2 One donor could save the lives of 3 people.
Last week started off as a non Dana Farber Wednesday and after having an early morning test done we were on our way to MGH for another scheduled test. In the car we received a call from my hematologist with concerns from my weekly home labs. Due to an unstable drop pattern since the beginning of December they felt it was important for us to reschedule the test and go to Dana instead to receive a unit of blood. A normal transfusion for me is 3 units. So as I believe I have mentioned before a normal scheduled Dana Farber day, is broken into 3 parts and at each part you have to check in and check out and you also wear a GPS badge so they know where to find you. You first check in starting at the lab, then visiting with the doctor, and then depending on the visit an infusion , bone marrow shot and or a transfusion. Because we were not scheduled we went to the lab, got some lunch and went up to transfusion suites. We did not have a appointment with doctor just a time slot to receive my blood. It is a rather slow process because of how much goes into each bag. It typically takes about 2-3 hours from the time the dr. ordered it. On a normal day, we would wait for about 2 hours then get situated in a bed, get my pre drugs and I would get 3 units once started it would go about 4.5 hours. On this day we waited in the waiting room for a few hours. They eventually came out and put us in room so I could at least lay down. The nurse told me that they were having a hard time matching it, and this was for just one unit. Although I have a common blood type, because of my auto immune disease my blood also has a number of other antibodies it has to match. The more antibodies they can match it to the less chance of my body rejecting the blood. This is the same process we go through every time I need blood but for some reason on this day, my transfusion started 4 hours after my original blood draw. They didn't really give us an explanation, however later they said that it could have been harder to match because I had just had IVIG the day before and maybe it affected the amount of antibodies. So of course rush hour drive home from Boston.
So now its Monday, blood has been drawn, it is a Dana Farber Wednesday with an extra bonus of an ultrasound of my neck to see if the clots, that could have at any time broke off and caused a stroke have dissolved. It is also a bone marrow shot and more then likely a transfusion, cant imagine how long it will take to make me 3 bags if one took 4 hours. So now I wait, I wait for the call to see if the symptoms I am dealing with today is related to my blood counts. If they are not this obstacle remains incomplete.
However, friendly reminder spread it to your friends, one blood donation could save 3 lives, in America every 2 seconds someone needs blood.
I do want to reiterate that I do appreciate and love any and every gift I have been given, some more then others:) Sorry about the furby mom, but he deserved a chance to fly even if the flight was out my window. And after I got my first coach purse and my first Pandora bracelet, I began to love pricier gifts.
In college one of my really good friends from home was coming to my school to celebrate my birthday and he had kept asking me what I wanted and I told him I didn't want anything, his visit was enough. This was at the beginning of my journey and I had just started receiving IVIG ( basically my immune system, formed from many blood donors.), a month before. When he got there he handed me a card and I put it aside for later when I could read it. After a great birthday and everyone else had passed out, I opened the card and what was in it caught me off guard. I don't remember exactly what it looked like but basically it was a piece of paper that was from the American Red Cross and it said the above person has donated blood in your name to the blood bank. Sure a tablet, an iphone, or a coach purse are nice to have and show off but in the event of an emergency can they save your life?
Although this was such a long time ago a recent Dana Farber visit made me remember it very clear. Again a reminder, this blog is for awareness and in no way am I begging or even asking for your blood. The number one reason people don't donate blood is because they just never thought about it, never had a reason to. Before I really got sick, I had a similar thought process, but now that I require the help of donors to live I did a little research. When I was looking at the American Red cross blood center homepage some of the statistics and information were shocking to me. I am sure that most "healthy" people do not even know their blood type and have never had it checked, Because when I too was " healthy" I never even thought about my blood type. However now I have a card that I am suppose to have in my wallet at all times and my medical bracelet should read O-. I am not going to turn this into a lesson on blood donating but I just wanted to share 2 statistics that relate to me and my last Dana Farber day.
#1 the most common type of blood is O-, great demand and short supplied.
#2 One donor could save the lives of 3 people.
Last week started off as a non Dana Farber Wednesday and after having an early morning test done we were on our way to MGH for another scheduled test. In the car we received a call from my hematologist with concerns from my weekly home labs. Due to an unstable drop pattern since the beginning of December they felt it was important for us to reschedule the test and go to Dana instead to receive a unit of blood. A normal transfusion for me is 3 units. So as I believe I have mentioned before a normal scheduled Dana Farber day, is broken into 3 parts and at each part you have to check in and check out and you also wear a GPS badge so they know where to find you. You first check in starting at the lab, then visiting with the doctor, and then depending on the visit an infusion , bone marrow shot and or a transfusion. Because we were not scheduled we went to the lab, got some lunch and went up to transfusion suites. We did not have a appointment with doctor just a time slot to receive my blood. It is a rather slow process because of how much goes into each bag. It typically takes about 2-3 hours from the time the dr. ordered it. On a normal day, we would wait for about 2 hours then get situated in a bed, get my pre drugs and I would get 3 units once started it would go about 4.5 hours. On this day we waited in the waiting room for a few hours. They eventually came out and put us in room so I could at least lay down. The nurse told me that they were having a hard time matching it, and this was for just one unit. Although I have a common blood type, because of my auto immune disease my blood also has a number of other antibodies it has to match. The more antibodies they can match it to the less chance of my body rejecting the blood. This is the same process we go through every time I need blood but for some reason on this day, my transfusion started 4 hours after my original blood draw. They didn't really give us an explanation, however later they said that it could have been harder to match because I had just had IVIG the day before and maybe it affected the amount of antibodies. So of course rush hour drive home from Boston.
So now its Monday, blood has been drawn, it is a Dana Farber Wednesday with an extra bonus of an ultrasound of my neck to see if the clots, that could have at any time broke off and caused a stroke have dissolved. It is also a bone marrow shot and more then likely a transfusion, cant imagine how long it will take to make me 3 bags if one took 4 hours. So now I wait, I wait for the call to see if the symptoms I am dealing with today is related to my blood counts. If they are not this obstacle remains incomplete.
However, friendly reminder spread it to your friends, one blood donation could save 3 lives, in America every 2 seconds someone needs blood.
Your strength has never failed to amaze me. I can't imagine going through a fraction of what you have had to deal with. It takes a special person to do what you have managed to do Tiff. Everyone could learn a lot from your perseverance
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