Friends,

The last weeks have been full of challenges and blessings. Some challenges are blessings, and some of course are just challenges. Let me start with the most recent. This last Sunday, Menchie and I competed in the Lavaman Triathlon in Waikaloa Village on the Big Island of Hawaii. In this event, we swam .9 miles, rode our bikes 25 miles and then ran 6.2 miles. The cycle portion and part of the run portion of the course was over some of the most desolate landscape you could imagine. Lava flows dotted occasionally with sparse grass with occasional breaks in the lava for desert scrub forests. The temperature and the humidity were high. Those were some of the challenges. The swim was in a protected bay in crystal clear water, and I considered the landscape quite beautiful in a stark desolate way, so watching the fish and sea turtles darting through the colorful coral during the swim was fun. I also enjoyed the scenery on the ride and the run. I completed the course almost three hours after the race winner, Chris McCormick, who was very nice when I met him. My time was 4:38. I placed 850th out of about 870 finishers. Chris’s time was 1:49, a new course record. It was a wonderful event, and we really enjoyed it.

I wanted to thank all of you who so generously helped us with your donations. We had an anonymous donor a couple of weeks ago who got us within easy striking distance of our fund raising requirements, so that helped immensely. We wish we could personally express our gratitude to that donor, but we suspect that it was someone on this mailing list, so whoever you are, thank you so much for your incredibly generous donation, helping us to conquer blood cancers.

There are about 12 pictures featured on the Lavaman picture web site in a slide show, and amazingly, I am shown in the 9th slide running in to the finish with my teammates behind me cheering me on. The URL if you would like to look at the picture is http://www.printroom.com/event.asp?domain_name=photoman&group_id=69. There are lots of pictures in the site galleries. If you want to find me, my event number is 825 and Menchie’s is 611. Menchie only had pictures taken during the cycle portion, and I am in the unknown pictures of the swimmers along with Menchie since I was wearing a wet suit and they couldn’t see my number.

In other areas of our life, we continue to struggle. We found a place to live, but the day before we went to look at it, I found out I was loosing my job on April 2, this Friday, so we decided not to rent a new place. We will stay in our home until I get a new job and can afford to rent somewhere or until the bank kicks us out whichever comes first. I am looking hard for jobs in the Albuquerque area, so we may move to our home in Mountainair soon. One way or another, we will survive this challenge too with our heads held high.

On the medical front, I have gotten immensely stronger during our training, and the doctors were impressed. However, there have been some challenges. My testosterone levels have fallen some, and we are considering some supplementation. A little extra testosterone would have probably been a great help in Lavaman. In addition, my creatinine levels were a little high, at 15, indication possible kidney problems. I think it is quite likely that it is due to all the working out we have done, and I was probably a little dehydrated. Hopefully, that will be cleared up in my next appointment. I have an appointment tomorrow morning with my dermatologist, and I have a lot of issues to discuss with him. I suspect more surgery is in the near future for me.

One of the big issues I have with loosing my job is that I loose my health coverage also. Fortunately, I have VA coverage and have set that in motion to maintain my prescriptions and things. My Hematology-Oncologist, Dr. Mason, told me he would see me for free if I didn’t have insurance! I am very grateful for his generosity. We do not have coverage for Menchie though, and that is worrisome.

We face a lot of challenges, and some times it is hard to stay positive. It is very tempting to just stop and wallow in the unfairness of it all. I feel much more capable to deal with the situation now than I did six months ago, so we are doing OK at the moment.

I don’t have the lab work handy. It was all normal anyway. On the medical front, I am getting off the mega-doses of vitamin D and just going to a regular supplement. I may start testosterone supplements, and I have stopped taking the midodrine, as my blood pressure was going up too high and I have not been suffering from the hypotension as much. I am still taking levothyroxine and probably will be taking that for the rest of my life, as it appears I have lost a lot of thyroid function due to my treatments. The tilt table test I took didn’t reveal anything, so that was a disappointment. I was scheduled for a Rituxan treatment last week, but my doctor canceled that to give my immune system a chance to recover a little bit since my GVHD is very quite.

That is about all for now! We hope this note finds you all very well. Take care!

Ted
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