Unsung Heroes: Seattle part II

Pour les français, vous pouvez traduire ce post avec Google Translate. C'est le dernier post sur ce thème, demain soit je vous reparle soit de cancer (super!!!) soit d'un sujet secret que j'ai en réserve.

Help sometimes comes in strange ways. In that case, it came under the guise of a tall, hairy guy named Jeff. The kinda guy you imagine more easily on the slopes of a mountain with a hippie hat on his head that in a lab. As it turns out, Jeff, who worked with Celia for some time, got the same exact leukemia as I got when he was 18, ten years ago. The same exact one, down to the exact same darn mutation (the Philadelphia Chromosome). He got a transplant, and survived.

Turns out, Jeff was actually in my room when the doctor gave me the final blow ("I'm afraid you are PhC positive, which is not the best of things."). And Jeff, who was standing there, said in his characteristically nonchalant way "Oh, I got that one too. No biggie, see, I'm still here!". Talk about a morale boost!

Nowadays, Jeff and his wonderful wife Evlyn also take care of our two cats, that we can't have at home while I'm under immunosupressive drugs, so that's another big thanks to them.

I call them the three musketeers because when one is in sight, the others are usually not far away. Can, Emre and Santosh, They've been there through the toughest times and I shared with them the toughest things. Can't thank them enough. Plus Can was always here to drive me in the direst emergencies ;) ("My graphics card crashed, I need a new one NOW"). Can, you just rock. And you are a rock, and it's awesome to have you has a friend.

It might seem very weird to my french readers but even the management team from our building has been super supportive. They fixed everything they could in the building before me coming from the hospital, they handle all my special meds deliveries like champs. I know these guys are paid to do this and to do it well, but nevertheless, it seems important to me to highlight the fact that they actually take things very seriously and bust their ass for us.

Like in France, people have also been really great at organizing blood drives, both at my work and at Celia's. The turnout as been spectacular, and at both events some people actually couldn't donate blood because the attendance was so massive that they did not have any supplies for everybody. I have also to thank the O'Roark family for their "1 pint of beer for 1 pint of blood" that was a fun way to get more people to come. A nice thing is that three month later, the attendance is still high, and that's great.

A lot of persons also showed up to help Celia sanitize our apartment. Basically, everything had to be cleaned, bleached, pretty much sterilized before I came back home, and the furniture had to be moved over so that a professional team could do an antibacterial carpet cleaning. A lot of work she couldn't have done without Santosh, Sarah, Kathy.

To finish this long list of thank you, I have to talk about three more persons. First I have to reiterate my thanks to Simon and Lea (and her husband Rich). I dropped a huge bomb on them, and they handled it very gracefully. They are both incredibly busy persons and they have a lot on their plate already but still they've always been only one phone call away. I don't think words can express how grateful I feel to them both.

To tell you about the last person I want to talk about, I have first to tell you a little story. One Wednesday, when preparing for transplant, I had a lumbar puncture scheduled at 2PM. For it, I have to have a caregiver present, because I'm sedated so I can't take care of myself. At around noon, Celia starts preparing food and suddenly cuts herself. Badly. So badly in fact, that I have to take the car and drive her to the emergency room to get stitches (she got 4 stitches and got really lucky, she narrowly missed the tendons). At 1.45PM, it was clear that she was in no state to drive.

So I called Emily, and asked her to leave work for the afternoon, and drive me to the lumbar puncture and stay with me during the whole procedure. Why her? Because I'm scared of lumbar punctures, and she is the person I feel most comfortable with. I trust her. She said "Ok" and 5 minutes later, was waiting for me on the curb and went and spent the whole procedure with me, and then drove me back home.

Why is it so amazing and why do I spend so much time talking about this? Well because at that time, she was 8 month pregnant. Yes, you read that right. And by the way, she recently gve birth to a little Oscar, congratulations Emily! And thank you again for being an amazing friend.

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