About five or six years ago, while walking across campus in Boston, the local Hillel House was having a drive to register marrow donors of Eastern European descent in an attempt to find a match for a specific person. Given that a sizeable branch of my family tree is labeled “those wacky Poles”, I dutifully signed up, had blood drawn, got a cookie, the whole shebang.
Last Thursday, I got a call from the NMDP which was trying to track me down. I’ve come up as a match for a non-relative donor, and tomorrow I get to head in for more detailed bloodwork to determine if it’s more than just a preliminary match. And if that works, then sometime in the near future they’re going to jab a needle into my pelvic bone and suck out about a liter of bone marrow.
Last week I donated platelets, so I’m feeling something akin to a clearinghouse of bodily fluids. I’ll try to answer as many questions as I can, but if someone more knowledgeable happens to chime in before me, be my guest. (Spiff? Are you out there?)
So fire away. I’ll update with details as events warrant.
Congratulations lno!! I’ve been on the registry since 1988 and have never been called. And my next platelet donation is Wednesday.
You’ll have to tell us how it feels. Whenever I mention it, someone always says, “oooo that’s supposed to HURT!!” I explain that it’s not really painful, more like uncomfortable. So, when it’s over, give us the straight dope.
Can you change your mind now that you signed up? Like if you don’t want them to stab you, could you say, “you know what, I’m not gonna go through with this, see ya.”
At this point, yes, I can still change my mind. I don’t intend to, but I also don’t know what the cutoff point is – when they’d say “tough luck, too late now” if I said I wanted to back out. I’ll ask tomorrow and get back to you.
Odds are if I’m prone on the operating table and they’re starting to anesthetize me, they may be a little miffed if I decide it’s time for a walk.
From marrow.org’s detailed description of marrow donation:
Bolding mine. I said something a little cruder than “Holy Moses” when I read that, as I expected just a wee syringe or so. Huh. A liter. That’s a lot.
As to meeting the recipient, I’ll rely on marrow.org again:
As to sparking a love with the patient, I think Elenfair may be peeved at me about that.
And so they drained out about six or seven tubes of blood to be sent off for more antigen matching. The patient is 22 years old and has acute lymphoblastic leukemia, and it’ll take about 4-8 weeks for them to finish the testing and get back to me.
If this thread is dead by then (and what thread lasts that long, anyway?) I’ll bump it for further updates.
So how did it work out lno, if you don’t mind me asking.
I am now at the same stage you were at your last post (I have provided the additional blood samples for further tissue testing, and am waiting to find out if i am indeed a full match)
Did they ever come back to you?
Were you a match?
Have you gone through with it?
If you have - how much does it hurt?
Several weeks after the antigen matching, they called and informed me that I was not a perfect match, and the patient’s physician was continuing to search for a better match. They told me I’d be called at a later date if the physician decided I was the best available donor.
They never called again, which was slightly disappointing—I was looking forward to going through with it.