The Marathon...

Dear Team Boyd,

David and I are in the car heading home from Northside Hospital. We met with our doctor and have been given an enormous amount of information. This e-mail will not be eloquent; I'm just going to put it all out there.

David has an extremely resistant lymphoma. While he has greatly improved since his initial admittance to Northside, he has not reached even a partial remission. However, his blood counts and organ function are strong at the moment. As a result, it looks like our best option is to proceed with an allogeneic bone marrow transplant. Allogeneic is a fancy word for a transplant from a donor. It is riskier but more effective in curing the disease than if they used his own bone marrow. I'm not going to give the percentages...we threw out probability and statistics several months ago. As David says, "Don't give me easy; just give me possible."

The time line will look a little something like this: first, David will get one more round of RICE chemo at Athens Regional starting Monday. Meanwhile, our doctors and coordinators at Northside will be preparing for the transplant. Two weeks after the RICE, David will go back to Northside to undergo all sorts of tests to make sure the transplant can happen. The donor, a player to be named later, will begin his process of having his stem cells harvested. By mid August, David will be admitted to Northside where he will receive a high dose of chemo to wipe out his system. Immediately afterwards he will get the transplant. On average, patients stay in the hospital 10 to 14 days. 30 to 100 days after, he will go to the Northside clinic daily. Therefore, he will have to stay in the Atlanta area while he is an outpatient. He will be on immune suppressant drugs for 6 months at the very least. He will have to avoid crowds and anyone with a hint of illness.

During the first 100 days, the doctors will be looking for signs of graft host disease where the transplant begins to reject David's body (here lies the major risk involved). The graft rejection can be treated as long as it is not overwhelming. Some rejection is expected and can even be a good thing in small doses early on. Graft host rejection could happen at anytime during the first year and sometimes into the second year.

With all that said, we are going to eat this elephant one bite at a time. Once we get dates I will sit down with my list makers and figure out what we need and when. This is going to be one long marathon, people. We need to rest up and grab some really good energy snacks.

As David and I continue to process all of the information and consider the incredible obstacle lying in front of us, we will continue to share our journey with you. At this time, the things we need right now that each of you can give are positive energy and the power of prayer.

Much love,
Lisa