The Re-Infusion (& Some Neutropenia)

After nearly a week of chemotherapy, which had decimated (again, not annihilated) my white blood cell count, it was finally time for my stem cells to be reintroduced to my body. As I mentioned previously, these stem cells had been inflated in number by multiple subcutaneous injections of Neupogen, a drug that does that sort of thing. A centrifuge had separated them from the rest of my blood, and now here they were, squeaky-clean and primed for action.

And smoking. Some dude in a lab coat that looked like the prototypical “mad scientist” wheeled in a white barrel that held my stem cells. Once he removed the lid, a diffusive cloud spilled from the chasm. Dry ice had been used to keep my stem cells cold and ready for the re-infusion. The anonymous scientist--I’m sure he had a name, but I don’t know it, and I don’t think he ever said it--reached a gloved hand into the smoke and retrieved a small red-orange bag that contained my stem cells.

Truly, the entire process was a bit anticlimactic. My favorite aunt (a small feat with regard to my “dad’s” side of the family, and marginally more difficult on my mother’s--mostly because most of them live quite far away), Terri, had come with my mother to watch the procedure, which lasted approximately twenty minutes. Maybe a few more, but the whole thing definitely did not run longer than half an hour. The bag was connected to my PICC line, and the stem cells flowed from the bag into my blood. It was a simple one-way transfusion, and nothing more.

The only minor bit of action happened when my face turned crimson after a few minutes. Apparently, this was expected, but for a moment I felt like Veruca Salt from Willy Wonka. Except, you know, red. And pre-juice-inflation. My body or face did not grow tumescent to mimic the globular shape of a tomato, but my cheeks turned comically cherry-red. "Ruddy" would be an understatement.

Then, after not even half an hour, it was over. So that’s the big stem cell story.

What did happen, later that night, was that I became severely neutropenic, which means that my white blood cell count plummeted, and, as a result, I became quite weak. So weak, in fact, that I had no idea that I would not be able, later that night, to walk to the toilet for a routine round of urination. When I stood up, my legs crumpled immediately, and I fell to the ground like The Bride in Kill Bill when she emerges from her coma and tries to walk. Like her, I hit the floor, but luckily my cane was close by, and I was able to grab it and use it to reach the nurse call button. In the interim was a pathetic display of urinary incontinence that I had no control over.

Finally, the nurses arrived with a hydraulic lift that picked me off the floor with the help of a thick sling made of green fabric. It lifted me up and deposited me onto the toilet, although I didn’t need it at this point because most of what was meant for it had already been disseminated onto the floor by then.

I did have a new word in my vocabulary, though, which may have made the whole pitiful scene worthwhile: neutropenia.

Say it with me: new-trow-pee (very apt by then)-knee-uh.

R