Tuesday, Dec. 29. Tommy is at the hospital this morning getting his stem cells harvested. He has had shots for three days, plus today, to generate more cells. The harvest will take about 4 hours. He will go back to the hospital tomorrow to see if there were enough stem cells; if not, they will give him another neupogen shot and do some more harvesting. Roy has a 1:30 appt. for blood work, then another appts. and will meet with the doctor at 3:30. After the meeting he will be admitted to the hospital. Yesterday Roy had another CT scan, but not another chest xray as we thought he was going to have. I am sure the doctor will tell us all the pros and cons of the transplant but unless he definitely will not do it, Roy is going ahead with it. Otherwise, there is not much they can do, but I will ask that also. He seems really tired this morning, but I think he is very anxious also. I am not sure how long it will take him to get admitted as it will depend on room availability and then tomorrow they will start the hard chemo to try and kill all the AML. He will have 4-5 days of chemo, I can't remember which, as for older folks they won't give the really, really hard stuff but an extra day or two of a lesser amount. He will then rest a day or two and then have the stem cells. He will be in the hospital about 30 days, and that is if everything goes as scheduled. It is going to be hard on Roy but I will get tired also but will try and rest as much as possible. There is a Murphy bed in his room if I need to stay or want to stay, but a class we went to said I needed to get my rest because when he gets home I will be really tired taking care of him and that I need to be well rested when he gets home. So I hope I will only have to stay during the day but come home in the evenings and rest.

Colleen and the girls will be going to the Galleria Mall this afternoon while we are at the hospital since Madison isn't old enough to get in the hospital and they will be going ice skating. The hospital won't let any child 12 and under in because of the H1N1 flu. Madison will be 13 the middle of February, so I think I will ask Roy's floor nurse if Madison can come up tomorrow before they leave but if not, I understand. They will be eating dinner at the Mall since I don't know how long I will be at the hospital. Then tomorrow the girls and I will go out and eat. They will be leaving early Thursday morning heading back to Kansas but will be back down over spring break in March. Hopefully at that time it will be warmer for them when they go to Galveston. They went yesterday since it was sunshiny and even waded in the water. The girls had a good time and enjoyed themselves.