We are starting next phase

We went and talked to the doctor on Thursday and they said that we need to start the next phase.  Alyssa has to go up to hospital Friday-Monday and get a shot to boost her white blood cells.  On Monday after getting the shot they will take a blood sample and see if it is high enough to start the collection process of her stem cells.  If the number is high enough we will go in on Tuesday and start the collection.  They use 2 of her central lines and pull blood out of her and  get the stem cells and they but the blood back into her.  This usually takes around 4 hours.  After they collect it they send it to the lab.  They have to collect 500 million cells.  If they get enough the first collection then we are done, if they don't get enough cells then we keep going every day until they get enough.   They have to send the blood to be tested to make sure there are no leukemia cells in her blood.  The blood test takes a week to get the results.  When the test results come back negative then we start the next process of being admitted to the hospital and getting chemo and the transplant. 

With the shot that they give her they told her she would have a headache and some bone ache.  She said that she had a slight headache today.  We are pretty excited to move on to this next phase.  We are just hoping that our house sells fast so we can finally get settled in our own home.