stem cell donation

markwell, the first round was chemo and they told me i had like an 88% chance of coming throughchemo and i got chemo for about 8 or 9 months. and after my first round i went into remissionand everything was fine but after about, in the spring of ’04, they did a chromosomecheck on me and there was an abnormality with my chromosomes. so they knew that there wassomething wrong, the chemo didn’t work and that i was gonna have to have stem cell orbone marrow transplant. you’re laying in a hospital every day isa new day and every day they are coming in to tell you whether or not they found a donor.the day that they came in and told me that everybody was super excited.

guyas far as giving, and giving the traditional way, it was not bad i didn’t think it wasfairly easy thing, fairly easy ordeal. it’s go in, prep you just like they would for asurgery. that morning and i was in recovery a couple hours later. and stayed in recoverythere for a couple hours and they discharged me directly from recovery. markthe day of the transplant actually went really, really smooth for me because it was just anotherday in the hospital for me. all i had to do was just lay there and get my iv, like anyother day, but i was getting stem cells. and i think it took maybe 4 or 5 hours after thewhole process was over with. at that point

i didn’t really think of you know, whetherit was gonna work or not i just knew that the first option didn’t work and this wasthe second step of what they said that i would be going through in case the chemo didn’twork in the first place. so, i was just going along with what the doctors were telling meto do and thankful that they had found a match. after the transplant, the doctors were completelyamazed because usually after a stem cell transplant, or any type of transplant, patients receivesome type of blood transfusion or plasma or something, but i didn’t have to have anyof that. and obviously i thought that was good and i was talking with my doctor andhe’s like “yea, i guess we’d have to call you the poster child because you’rethe first patient ever down here in rochester

at the mayo clinic to go through a stem-celltransplant, or any type of transplant, and not receive a transfusion afterwards.” guyi had an immediate update on the recipient after donating within a week. of course theytold me his receipt was fine, everything went great in the hospital. and then, i don’tknow if it was then or a couple days later, she called me back tell me he was out of thehospital, he was looking great. said he was actually back at school within a very smallamount of time period and he was doing well. marki haven’t had any contact. i had found out that, some information that it was from alabamaand that it was a guy. but really that was

all i, all i knew. and then i got a call fromyou guys asking me if i wanted to meet him. guysometimes i know, i’ve seen some reunions of donor/recipient, organ donor recipientsand that type of thing and sometimes after time it’s even more pronounced, i guess,emotionally. but, i don’t know how i’ll greet mark.i gave out of the original intent i gave for and that was for a friend of mine. and that’swhy i got on the registry. guyhow do you feel? marki feel awesome. guygood.

markhow do you feel? guyi don’t know what you looked like before, but you look good. markbe the match to me is obviously something very special, important to me because if itwasn’t for everybody that’s involved in it and from my donor and all my doctors andeverybody that got together and made this happen. obviously this interview probablywouldn’t be taking place. guybe the match to me means it’s provided me a means to give something that means somethingof course to someone else, the recipient.

it means life and but, it afforded me theopportunity to do it with very, very little sacrifice, very little discomfort, very littlepain, i would say. and the program was great all the way through i had no financial outlaythat i had to do, everything was provided, people were great in the program. and youknow to be able to give person life, basically, with no sacrifices it’s quite remarkable.