Birthday Presents

Sunday was my birthday. Well, my other birthday. A year ago I got my new German stem cells. I can’t believe it’s been a year since the transfusion. There’s been sooooo much change I’ll give y’all a quick catch up and then we’ll move to more interesting topics. Did I get any birthday presents? A couple of margaritas and spending time with folks I love.

In late spring several things happened almost at once. My labs got better and better. Maggie, my NP took me off of the ProGraf and a number of my other medications. I got two of the three rounds of my early childhood medications (my new blood didn’t have very much immune protection.) I started walking in the mornings a couple of days a week with Vince and Tom. I was still 50 or so pounds down and looking like a cancer patient (I can say that because I WAS a cancer patient,) so I started working with a trainer at the gym twice a week. I still get the pinpricks on my skin when I’m warm and I still have some tremors in my left hand, but I can drink the hell out of coffee again. My energy came back about 90 percent and continues to improve.

My friend Molly offered me a job, so I started working in production finance at Adult Swim on Cartoon Network. Mark had some weird health stuff that stuck around for a bit in the summer. Someone t boned his Tesla, his brother died and we ended up in the ER one early Sunday morning. So it was kind of a crappy summer, but at least I felt well enough to help out. We got through it.

I’ve got my energy back, my ankle feels like nothing ever happened to it and I’m still down almost 50 pounds. I hardly ever think about all that happened last year. I don’t dwell on any of it anymore. There’s no point.

The last few months have been pretty great. The guy who framed the carriage house pulled up the gross blue carpeting on the stairs and upstairs and put down new flooring. I redid my office. We had a fun weekend in upstate New York. Mark and I celebrated our eleventh anniversary on a clipper in Casco Bay, eating lobster rolls and exploring the outdoors in Maine.

I’ve been incredibly lucky. 2023 was a huge challenge, but I think about it less and less. I still make movies in my head sometimes but that’s what XANAX is for. I’m full of hope and thoughts of the future again, which is nice.