The first week was much like any other week we had spent in the hospital.... but with a smaller room, more equipment and more family. Andrew was completely himself. It seemed there was always someone up there by his side beside me. I spent as much time as I could with him, but found myself looking for excuses to leave to get away from all the family rubbing his feet and feeding him grapes. They would try to talk me into sleeping at home and getting some "good rest" and letting them stay up there with him. I wouldn't have it. The way I saw it, that was the only time I got him to myself and we got to somewhat resemble a normal life. I was not giving that up.
Andrew was counting down the days to his life-changing transplant and I was actually jealous. It's a strange and disheartening feeling to be jealous of someone fighting for his life; to be jealous of someone looking to you for support. Then, the day finally came for the transplant. There was so much emotion and hope in the room, one could choke on it. The nurses would come in with their big smiles and ask, "Are you excited??" or "Today's the day!" And all that "excited" talk. All the talk acted like someone who tries to hype you up for a big movie or something... talks the excitement or comedy up. Of course, in that situation, the person hypes it up so much that when you see the movie, it's not nearly as "exciting" or as "funny" as it had been made out to be. Oddly enough, the transplant resembled that perfectly. (I'm sure waiting around all day until 5:30 p.m. or so didn't really help that much.)
The most exciting part about the actual transplant was when the donated marrow arrived. An entire entourage of doctors and nurses and important looking people came marching in with a "bio-hazard" ice chest from the helicopter. It was very official... and resembled a prime-time drama. The nurses read the information from the tags to each other, confirming the tags to their notes, then to Andrew's tags and number. They asked Andrew his name and birthday to be sure they were giving the right stem cells to the right recipient. After all was confirmed, they hung an IV bag that closely resembled tomato soup on his IV tower and hooked him up. Voila! It was done. I'm not sure what I was expecting... but it wasn't that.
They brought in balloons for him and sang "Happy Birthday!" I think we were all strangely disappointed at how simple and uneventful it was. In retrospect, we should have savored the simplicity and ease even more! The weeks to follow were hell.
