[Ang287Participant]

Hi Everyone
It’s now a year since my husband was diagnosed with multiple myeloma. He had his stem cell transplant in February and goest back to hospital on Tuesday for a bone marrow biopsy to see if this has worked and he is in remission – keep your fingers crossed. He is doing well and gaining weight.
The last year has been so hard for all of us and I don’t know how I would have coped without this site and the discussion forum – we have learned so much about a disease we had never heard of before.
Our eldest dauther Alex and myself are doing the BUPA Manchester 10K run and want to raise money for MYeloma UK. If anyone would like to sponsor us our just giving page is as follows:

http://www.justgiving.com/Angela-AlexSmithies1

Thanks and hope everyone is having a good weekend. I am going out for a practice run soon and hope I don’t fall on my face like I did 3 weeks ago. Still got a painful right knee and right shoulder so that’s my excuse if I come in last!

[meganjaneParticipant]

Hi Angela,

Good luck to you and Alex for your run and thank you for helping to raise money for Myeloma UK. I hope the bone marrow biopsy on Tuesday brings good news.

Megan

[Ang287Participant]

Thanks Megan – I will need the good luck and I am very optimistic that the bone marrow news will be good.

[dickbParticipant]

Hi Ang,

hope the run goes well. ironic isn’t it that such an awful illness could infact help improve the fitness and health of others 🙂

Hope the BMB goes well, what have his blood tests shown since Graham came out?

[Ang287Participant]

Hi Richard
The only results we were originally interested in were the neutrophils coming above 1 so that he could go out again. When we were last at the clinic we asked about paraproteins etc but were told that the tests were inconclusive yet so have not officially been told that his bloods are clear of the paraproteins. We won’t get result of BMB until 23rd May.
He has now officially taken voluntary redundancy with about a half year’s pay so he doesn’t have the pressure now of going back to such a stressful job.
How are you doing?
Angela

[dickbParticipant]

Hi Ang,

Doing Ok. had a 2nd opinion a couple of weeks ago because my SCT had not been particularly succesful the medics wanted to do another. – My IgG had only dropped to 23, they were 36 I believe before the SCT so the difference was minimal. Since the SCT I’ve had 3 blood tests and they have shown IgG stable at 23 so the agreed route is no further treatment for now just monthly blood tests. I should say that they also looked at calcium levels in the blood and as they were normal they were ok with the IgG being at the level it is. I won’t have a BMB – my consultant doesn’t see the point as she can get all the info she needs in other ways. Besides the BMB will only tell youi if you have MM cells in one particular part of the body at that given time.

So it’s off for blood tests and Biosphosphomide next week. All good fun. I hope you are ok with Graham being redundent, the reason I say that is because I haven’t worked since Nov 2012 and I hate it I’m afraid, you can only clean a house so many times a day. My unemployment is compounded by being in a different country, my language skills are still poor and my age. There are plenty of young people here and Germany acknowledges that finding work for a fit healthy qualified 50 year old national is hard anyway. That for me is the worse thing about MM, it will totally screw up your future probably more than any other cancer. The biggest concern is financial. If the redundancy pays enough for you to be confortable in the short to medium term than you should be ok.

[Ang287Participant]

We did the run in awful hot weather. We have so far raised nearly £300. If anyone wants to sponsor us after the event I think the just giving page will be open for a few more weeks. Graham was told yesterday that he is in full remission so hoping this lasts a long time.

Richard – sorry to see your STC was not as successful but hope you are doing ok. We have enough from Graham’s redundancy for the next year so all the jobs around the house that he hasn’t had time for hopefully will start getting done now when he is feeling up to it and it’s nice to come home from work to my tea made.
Angela

[dickbParticipant]

Hi Angela. Good news about Graham. I’m not too bothered just yet about the IgG level. The leader of the local self help group has had a IgG level of between 26 and 28 for the last 10 years and is managing OK. I haven’t got Kidney damage and my Calcium levels in the blood are normal. The last 3 blood blood test show no change in IgG also so it is a form of remission I suppose.

In a couple of weeks I go to a clinic to learn how to live with MM such as sport, activities, work etc so everyone here is working as if I have achieved remission.

Don’t push Graham too hard with jobs around the house, don’t want any silly accidents.

Richard

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