How this journey began

Many of you have asked what happened. Did I notice any symptoms? What do the doctors say? How am I feeling? I thought I would start with the basics for those of you who may have just learned that I have Leukemia.

Thursday night June 6th going into Friday morning while at work, I noticed my feet were swelling and I couldn't find my ankles. LOL. When I came home I took a water pill and drank some water thinking that it was the chips I ate from Panera Bread being too salty and this is part of getting older :-) Well, the swelling was still there when I went into work on Friday night. My chest was tight and felt like someone was pressing down on it. The pain began to travel up my glands and I had a stiff neck. I felt chills and had a rapid heart beat. Of course, not wanting to mess up my paid time off, I stuck it out at work until morning and thought I'd call the doctor. Something inside me told me I might be really sick, but I was hoping it was just a virus and didn't want the emergency room to charge me a lot of money to say I had the flu. I left work with about an hour left on my shift after some strong persuading from one of my managers, of course my co-workers and supervisor were telling me how bad I looked and I should go home the entire shift, I'm stubborn like that. I like to keep my commitments and do my job sick or not. I called my primary care who then directed me to the ER. It was there I found out that my white blood cells were abnormally high with cause for concern, and my red blood cells were too low and I needed a blood transfusion. They took several tests over the next two days and felt that they had compeling evidence of Leukemia but they needed to do a bone marrow biopsy to confirm. That is what led me to the University of Penn. I arrived here Tuesday night. Had the biopsy Wednesday and started Chemo first thing Friday morning. I am on a 24 hours a day for seven day treatment, with an additional chemo drug pushed through for 3 days. Today was my last for the other Chemo and I have 4 more days of the seven day treatment.

Next steps; After the chemo treatment on Friday the 20th, my B-day, I will wait a few days to see if my cells start to rebuild. They will do another bone marrow biopsy to see if I need additional chemo or something to help my cells rebuild. After another 10-14 days I should be able to come home. That is as much as I know for now. I will eventually come back for another round of chemo, and pray that I won't need a bone marrow transplant.

Did I have any other symptoms? Yes, but I didn't make any connections. I felt unusually tired for the past month. So tired that I could barely get though cleaning my house, and many of you know how compulsive I am about that :-) I just thought I was getting out of shape and hired a personal trainer of which I only had two sessions and then two days later ended up in the ER, go figure. Well, I will lose those extra ten pounds without the trainer now, that's a bonus. LOL. I also had noticed bruising. My King Da Ka ride 5x in a row left some serious ones, but there had been others that I noticed prior to that, enough so I was intending to go to the doctor about it that same week-end I ended up in the hospital. Also, my gums were very irritated and bleeding, which I thought was just me needing to floss more and get a better mouth wash. Who'da thought?

How am I feeling? I'm feeling pretty good despite my situation. God has given me a supernatural peace about everything. I have no fear and feel so blessed by the outpouring of love and concern from all of my family and friends. They emails are beautiful and encouraging. I have had a lot of visitors, even all the way out here in Philly. Thank you all for how much love you have showered me and my family.

Today I needed two more blood transfusions because my red cells dropped into the sixes again. That had me a little tired, but I'm feeling better now. So far I have not experienced any nausea from the Chemo..... Praise God! My hair will fall out, but the good thing is it could grow back curly, how cool is that! I'm going to sport a good wig in the interim.

Jim and the girls came to visit today. Megan brought Kelsey P along and the Schlaegel's were here too. It was great visiting with all of them.

I just want to thank you all again for the prayers and concern for me and my family. Know that God is in Control and He is good all the time. He comforts and protects those that seek refuge in Him. Psalm 23 has been a comfort to me, please read it and be encouraged. I know that I am safe and secure while in the valley because God is my Shepherd and I shall not want.

Love you all!!
~Edie