Update on My Grandson

Last Tuesday at 4:17am my wife and I received a text from my son-in-law that the midnight blood draw showed a .01 neutrophil count, 20 days after his bone marrow transplant, the first sign of engraftment. 1.5 to 8.0 is normal, but we are on our way. It was also my daughter’s birthday and it was her birthday wish to get this news.

I didn’t want to say anything until we saw more. So on Saturday he had a 0.2 neutrophil count and his white blood cell count was 0.4. Sunday, 0.6ANC and 0.5 WBC. Yesterday 0.5 ANC and 0.5 WBC. 

They will discharge him from the hospital when his neutrophil count is 0.5 three days in a row and they perform a bone marrow aspiration to verify engraftment. Let's see what tomorrow brings. My wife has been in NC since the first of the year to take care of Tripp's sister while the parents park it at the hospital, it will be nice to have her home again; but that's still a couple of weeks out.  

Sterling Manley and Coach Hubert Davis (UNC basketball) stopped by to see Tripp and check in on his recovery.  My  son-in-law Mark did his undergraduate at UNC and is of course a HUGE Tar Heel fan. Mark said “They brightened both our days (ok, probably mine more so than Tripp’s)”.

Keep the wonderful prayers coming. God is good.

He hasn't looked this good in over a year, aside from the chemo related hair loss. But that is minor stuff at this stage.