2nd dose of Rituximab

I had my 2nd (and hopefully last) dose of Rituximab last Wednesday.  It was a wonderfully uneventful infusion.  So unremarkable was it that Joacim and I slept through the entire thing.  I think I only have 1 photo from the entire day, and it was taken by Joacim after I was already done.

We originally thought that I would have lab done right before the infusion (you know...to see if it's working) but the nurse got a hold of Tammy (recipient coordinator) and told us that we'd do labs 30 days after the 2nd infusion.  It was a little bit of a bummer because I really want to know if it's working, but it wasn't to be that particular day.

I did, however, talk to Tammy the next day, and the transplant nephrologist is ALSO pretty keen to know if it's working, so he went ahead and scheduled a visit for the 25th of August.  We'll do bloodwork then, and a short visit, and if my B-cells are trending down like we hope (indicating that the Rituximab is working) then we can tentatively schedule a DATE FOR TRANSPLANT!!!!

YIPPEE!!!!!

More good news in that I officially started short term disability today.  Even after all of this time waiting, I was starting to feel like the transplant date was hurdling toward me, and I just didn't feel that I could get everything done that I wanted to get done before the transplant.  Things like making a will, and meeting with my financial advisor, and a lot of other crap like that takes a LOT of time, and I didn't have much of that to spare working full-time, mothering, wife-ing and dialyzing, so I decided it was in my best interest to stop working.

It wasn't exactly an easy decision to come to.  My friend, Holly, blames it on our midwestern work ethic (work unless you're dying) and she's probably on to something there.  It's not easy to admit that, even though I can physically do it, I'm not doing it very well.  I've always worked.  The only other times I haven't worked since college was maternity leave and an intermittent leave I took when my swelling was at it's worst.  Even through prednisone, I continued to work.

But not this time.  I'm going to use this time to get my house in order (physically and metaphorically).  I'd like to do some fun things with Izzy before school starts in a couple of weeks, and I want to get on a regular yoga schedule because it's still truly the only place I feel amazing.  I went during lunch today, and it was great to get back in class and sweat.  The hardest thing for me is to try to keep on some sort of a schedule.  I'm a night-owl by nature, and it's very tempting for me to stay up until all hours of the night enjoying the quiet, but then that would mean that I would sleep in too late and not get anything accomplished.

I see this transplant as a fresh, new start, but there's still a LOT of work to get done before then.