Transplant Updates - August 28th to September 10th

 This will be just a short post. As anyone following my story knows, I was expecting to have my bone marrow transplant this week as well as the pre-transplant chemo. My first 10/10 donor had proven unable to be contacted so we had been on the 2nd 10/10 donor; a Polish woman on the German registry.

At the end of my last post, on Thursday August 26th, it was confirmed that the Anthony Nolan charity had requested that I start the Chemotherapy after the donor had donated, and that their donation would be frozen while I had the chemotherapy. Apparently this has happened more often due to COVID, as obviously it would be bad if I went through the pre-transplant chemo and then COVID prevented the donation from happening.


On Monday September 6th the day before the individual was supposed to donate, as I was getting my stuff ready to be admitted into hospital, I was called up by one of the transplant doctors. The donor had decided to pull out. Obviously this was really disappointing news.


But it's not all bad news, I do have another 10/10 donor lined up. A young Polish woman also on the German register, 3rd time is the charm. No pressure where ever you are, if you're reading this donor haha. At the moment it is scheduled that she will be donating around the 5th of October and that I will be admitted into hospital to start the pre-transplant chemo at the end of this month. The doctors have confirmed that she's a really strong candidate and are confident it will go ahead  and as such it will be a fresh donation with no need of freezing.


There's always a "but" though. Because of the donor who cancelled, it has cost me several weeks. As such there is the risk that I can't go straight into the transplant and the pre-transplant chemotherapy. As a result I'm going to be having another bone marrow biopsy (my 9th one I think woohoo!) this coming Tuesday. The results of this, which will probably come through the following week, will determine if I need an additional round of chemo first. Fingers crossed I don't, because if I do the transplant will be delayed by at least another 6 weeks while I have more chemo then recover from it, before I could then have the pre-transplant chemo and transplant.


Finally as always, I want to thank everyone for their support it really has helped. All links for support are here https://linktr.ee/AdamRiley? 

I have shifted all blogs over to www.theadamriley.com but will try to still update here on blogger too.

Kay and John were able to raise over £700 for Anthony Nolan during their Tough Mudder run at the end of August!

Well earned pints for the boys!

Action shot

Top lads

The amazing people that are Nic and Lanna have also been donating blood. Nic has hit 50 plasma donations in the last three  years.


What a guy!

Wooo Lanna!



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