What The Heck!

At 49 yrs. old I woke up one Wednesday morning in 2004 with what I thought was gas pains in my upper abdomen so I ate antacids all day. The next day I woke up and it was worse so I took GasX for the rest of the day. Friday I woke up and couldn’t get out of bed because of the pain in my abdomen. I called my son and he picked me up and took me to the hospital. It was determined that my spleen was very enlarged.  Bloodwork was done and I was diagnosed with Philadelphia Chromosome+ for CML. My case was taken by a very highly respected oncologist at Helmans Cancer Institute in Pittsburgh Pa. A bone marrow sample was taken and we investigated the donor options. I was immediately put on 800mg. of Gleevec, daily. It took over a year before I reached hematological remission. There I stayed for several years until we decided to try and ween off of the TKI. We dropped to 600mg. and checked every two months. At four months I was still in remission so we dropped to 400mg. After four months at 400mg the Philadelphia Chromosome was detected so we went back to 600mg. and I went back into remission four months later. For 21 yrs. now I have survived this condition. Yes, there have been negative side effects, but all in all my body has accepted Gleevec well, so we will stay with this treatment until it is necessary to change. My hero is Mel Mann. I hope to meet him someday.