Christmas and New Year have snuck on by, and we are now in February. It’s been a while since I last wrote, some of which is the perpetual children related time issues, some of which is waiting for results.

Anyway, I now have the results courtesy of the professor. I called up four times for them, emailed twice and when that didn’t work out finally texted my consultant who I haven’t seen for five years, and he very kindly text me the results and then sent them by post. Probably not how the system should work but hey, at least I got them.

First the good news. My white cells have increased only marginally, three points, over the year. This is in line with my graphs and so as expected. Currently they sit at 33 or 29 point something for the lymphocytes. At this rate treatment for the white cell issue is still a number of years off.

Now, for those of you who read my results blog last year, you may remember my platelet count dropped to just under normal (150-440). It has been going down for the five and a half years I’ve had the condition, and has decreased from 240ish. This is caused by the spleen being larger. It’s normal job is to clean up old blood and keep you fresh. When it gets larger it gets greedy, and starts to take newer and newer blood to destroy, keeping lots more inside it. This leads to a depletion in the rest of the body, which is where I am.

So the results show I’m at 136. This is a condition in itself Thrombocytopenia and this can result in various things at a severe level (under 50). Like spontaneous bleeding and unexplained bruising. At the less severe end (where I am) it has limited impact, but can cause fatigue and general unexplained tiredness.

	Lymphocyte Count	White Blood Cell Count	Platelet Count
Average	1 to 4.8	4 to 11	150-440
06/10/2013	10.8	15.4	203
11/27/2013	9.7	14.3	208
3/26/2014	13.2	17.8	199
9/24/2014	18.2	23.7	187
12/18/2014	18.7	24	207
6/24/2015	18.1	22.9	188
04/01/2016	22.1	27.3	187
21/12/2016	22.8	28.5	176
22/12/2017	25.4	31.1	143
22/12/2018	29	33	135

This is actually something of a relief, odd as that sounds, because I have been super tired for the last year or so, and with two kids under three, just assumed I was being whiny. Turns out I am more tired than normal and this is probably why. It means I can now try and work around it without feeling like a major wimp.

The treatment is obvious, in terms of nuclear option. If I get the spleen removed the red cells will go back up to normal, and stay there. This won’t be a problem anymore (in all likelihood). Downside is I will have to take antibiotics for the rest of my life, and some places would be a challenge to travel to. Also major surgery always comes with risk attached.

So I would prefer to long it out for a year or two before I have to do something but that means dealing with the tiredness.

I am going to try and resolve elements of this through diet. I talked about this last year, but now I do really have to do it. I can switch to more red meat, and leafy vegetables, like kale and broccoli or similar. I am also going to try and get more sleep by strategic layins and earlier nights. This is a short term measure but should help in delaying surgery. If it doesn’t help then I will likely get my spleen whipped out (easy as that) in the next year or so.

Anyway, that’s where we are. A mixed bag of results, but entirely in line with my graphs.

Thanks for listening and being there for me when needed. All the best until the next post, and I will try and get something out about treatment (maybe spleenectomy) in a little more detail.

And for those of you who made it to the end, a Christmas snap of the kids and two of their great grandparents.

🙂