MCL and Me

I had my flu jabs on Monday and apart from a slight residual tenderness on the top of my left arm ( swine flu jab ) I don't have any other effects from the jab. The first couple of hours after the jabs my right arm ( conventional flu jab) ached a bit but that passed off .
Whether this is a good thing or a bad thing and means I have not made any antibodies I am not sure but either way I will not be changing my behaviour in terms of contact with people who have colds , coughs etc.
Gareth had his jabs and had a more noticeable tenderness on his arms, to the point where he could not sleep on the one side ( swine flu again ) so hopefully he is fully protected.
Aside from that things are going ok and I'm down to 2.5mg prednisone steroid a day without any noticeable increase in tiredness or the GVHD coming back.
Just as well as I have needed my energy to make the time to finish writing the first draft of my novel.....
NaNoWriMo Winner
At just past 13:30 today I was officially verified by …

Rated PG for pictures of warts on my.......toe.
I went to the transplant clinic this morning and was seen by the same consultant as last time. Overall things were fairly routine and we are going to reduce my prednisone steroid dose from 5mg one day and 2.5mg the next to just 2.5mg every day.
I've been here before, briefly, but at the time I didn't have the extra support from the hydrocortisone and fludrocortisone so my adrenals crashed and burned and I was in a bit of a state ( plus I then got a viral infection of some kind. ) Hopefully this time round I should keep reasonable energy levels as I taper down my steroid dose.
I mentioned in passing that I had got a wart or verruca on my big toe as I wanted to check if it was ok to use over the counter remedies to try and get rid of it. The doc said this was very common in transplant patients. Verrucas are caused by a virus, we many of us get them as kids and then we develop antibodies and probably never see them again. However my im…

Just a quick health bulletin. This week has been pretty much like the last three I am pleased to say. I've been going in to the office twice a week and working from home the rest.
Feeling the cold is still an issue and the heating has been on a fair bit more than usual perhaps at home. Also by the end of the day I do feel quite tired but can usually cope and still be productive with washing, ironing and writing.
The hyper-observant of you might have noticed last week's post of 4th November was labelled as T+413 ( i.e. 413 days post transplant ) but it was of course T + 414. I blame a mislabelling of dates in the little book I record how much I have had to drink each day ( to keep me on track for my 3 litres ). Normal service has been resumed.
NaNoWriMo
This blog is short partly because there is nothing much to report on the health front and partly because I'm using my energies to work on my novel. It's going pretty well , I passed the halfway word count of 25,000 words yes…

It was transplant clinic this morning and I saw the consultant who saw me through my transplant and the first three months post-procedure so it was nice to catch up with him.
We reviewed where I was with everything and the edited highlights are that I am going to stay on the same prednisolone dose of 5mg one day, 2.5mg the next and go back in two weeks' time.
I mentioned about how sensitive I am to the cold nowadays and have to warm up like a lizard basking on a sunny rock before I am fully functional. He said that is often a symptom of thyroid hormone levels but I'd had this tested last time I went to the clinic and he looked it up and the levels were fine. So we are just going to keep an eye on that.
I also mentioned I'd been getting a few aches and twinges in my shoulder and elbow of my right arm, not in the joints themselves but more where the tendons join. I only mentioned this in passing because I know GVHD can attack joints. I was surprised by how thoroughly he quest…