The Good News Continues....

Sam again.

It's Day +30 today and the good news keeps coming.

Graham had his Day +28 Bone Marrow Biopsy on Wednesday and we got the results today.

The bone marrow cells are all normal and 100% from the unexpanded cord blood stem cells (from Australia!) which means there is no sign of his immune system or the leukaemia. The new cells are working hard and producing Red Blood Cells (RBC), Platelets and White Blood Cells.

It was also the first day that his RBC and Platelets have increased without infusions so all is looking good.

He is still suffering a bit with nausea and fatigue but they are switching one of his anti-viral drugs today that has been wasting his minerals. So hopefully once his magnesium, phosphate and potassium levels are all normal again, he won't feel so tired.

He is also coming off a drug used to combat Graft vs Host Disease (when the new immune system attacks rapidly dividing parts of his body such as his skin and gut lining) as he only has a minor rash and this drug may be causing his nausea.

The picture above is of Zozobra and was sent by our friends Penny, Daniel, Fiona and Ciara in Santa Fe.

Penny says "Last night we kicked off the Santa Fe Fiesta with the burning of Zozobra. In the 1920's an artist started this tradition of burning Zozobra, or Old Man Gloom, who is burned in effigy to symbolically dispel the hardships and troubles of the past year.

Zozobra is a 60+ foot high marionette (largest in the world). Daniel has been involved in building Zozobra since he was small and now we take the girls along to stuff him with shredded paper and to paint him. On the night fire dancers taunt him while he throws his arms around and growls until finally the fire dancer "wins" and sets him alight. For years it has been a tradition to put "gloom notes" into the stuffing of Zozobra, when burned, the hardship/sorrow that is in the gloom note is gone. So, this year we put a gloom note in about Graham’s long tough fight, to send wishes that this will be over soon and you can all return home together as a family and to send our love and very best wishes to all of you."

What a wonderful sentiment. Thanks guys.