01:45: Leaving the house, driving to Houston, MD Anderson.

02:15: On the road after picking up Uncle Victor for the drive back since I won’t be able to drive back after anesthesia.

07:15: At MDAnderson. Nice 5 hour drive from New Orleans, no construction slowdowns or traffic headaches. Quick bathroom stop on the way in.

07:25: Check in at Laboratory for bloodtest on the second floor.

08:05: A nurse calls me, asks me my record number and puts on my ID bracelet. We walk to the back and she sticks me and takes my blood, 7 tubes worth. She then gives me a urine sample cup and I am expected to urinate some more after I just had my bathroom stop.

08:15: All done with labs. Onto my next stop.

08:20: I check in at Pharmacology Sampling on the first floor.

08:25: A nurse checks with me. She tells me they will draw labs. I tell her I just had labs drawn, she said this is for the test drug. In the future I should coke straight to them and they can draw all labs needed by the sampling and the doctors, so no double sticks. I’ll keep this in mind for next time. So I continue to wait to be called back.

08:35: I am brought back. The nurse sticks me twice on my left arm with no luck, and the she sticks my right arm once and gets it and takes one tube of blood.

08:45: All done there, time to head to third floor near elevator E for my bone marrow biopsy.

08:57: I sign in Pre-OP Anaesthesia.

9:00: I am sitting in the waiting room and fill out my paperwork.

09:07: A nurse comes and gets my vitals.

09:15: Done with preps, now just waiting again…

09:35: A nurse comes and gets just me brings me into an adjacent room and goes over my paperwork.  She tells me that she will start an IV.  She has to start the IV in one of my hands as the anticubical area is not good for this procedure as one will be laying down on their stomach with their head on their hands and therefore arms will be bent.  She gets a vein in my right hand but can’t push it all the way in.  She tries floating it in by starting the drip while trying to push in but that didn’t work either.  She then realizes that she didn’t put the cap on, so she undoes the line and puts the cap on the iv that  only allows the fluids to flow one way.  While she does this, I know it’s going to get bloody, so I don’t watch her unscrew the line then screw on the cap.  She then cleans up the mess.  The doctor and crna is ready for me. So a nurse grabs the bag of saline and walks me over to the room where the procedure will take place.  It  is a simple room, nothing fancy, just some medical equipment.  They tell me to lay down on my stomach and to remove any buckles or anything else that is holding my pants up.  I have elastic shorts on, so no worries there, so I lay down.  The doctor then tells me that he is going to prep me, and not start working on me just yet.   He pulls down my pants just a little bit so he can access the back of my hips and feels around and then marks them.  The CRNA is talking to me.  I ask him if he is going to give me a cocktail, and he tell me no, that the Propofal will take care of it for me.  He tell me let’s get started.  he tells me it is a white liquid and I may feel a burning sensation as it enters my vein.  Sure enough I see the white stuff in the IV tube and then I feel the burn but I also notice white stuff leaking from my hand.  I tell the CRNA this, and he says that it should be OK.  The drip was not leaking so I have good access, he will just monitor it, but I should feel it any second now.  Sure enough. I start feeling it and don’t fight it, I have been up all night, time for a good rest.

If anyone is to have a bone marrow biopsy, I strongly suggest sedation and being put under.  No pain whatsoever, excerpt for what you feel a little after, during is not a problem at all as you get a really good nap!

10:30: We are done.  I wake up, they have me sit up slowly and then help me in to a wheel chair, which I am to remain in for at least the next hour.

10:40: We are on our way to the Mays Building as that is where I need to go to get my Bone Density Scan.  Uncle Victor is wheeling me around in the wheel chair.

11:10: We check in at the front desk for Nuclear Medicine.  I shortly after doze off in the wheel chair in the large waiting area.

12:00: They call my name.  Uncle Victor wheels me to the back.

12:20: The nurse wheels me to the room, and has me lay down flat on the table to get scanned.  She first puts something under my feet and velcros my feet so they are turning inward.  She tells me that this is to open up the joints in my hips for the scan.  Once that is done, she then has me put my legs up on a block so as to flatten my lower back against the table, and then she runs scans of my spine.

12:35:  All done.  The nurse rolls me to an area where I can have the IV taken out of my hand.

12:45: All done, time to roll back over to the main building, we are done and time to go home, but first we are going to grab a bite to eat at the MD Anderson Cafe on the first floor of the main building.

1:05:  At the MD Anderson Cafe.  We decide on quick and easy Chick-Fillet chicken sandwiches.

2:00:  Back to the car, time for a trip home.

7:15:  Back home, not bad of a drive, a few batches of rain and other batches of traffic hitting cities at rush hour, but other than that, not bad at all!  I catch a few second ZzZz’s here and there on the way home.

10:00: ZzZzZzZzZzZzZzZz… Long day!