Dear family and friends:

Thank you so much for praying for Antonia and me during our trip to California. It was adventurous to say the least, but all went well in terms of safety during the trip. We found ourselves trying to navigate all the details of life without any of the usual help and amenities. So instead of a "normal" trip to the grocery store, it became an "adventure."

First of all, we are traveling in a car, which meant taking apart the wheelchair, once Antonia was safely placed in the front seat, then it meant putting the dismantled chair in the trunk. Once we arrived at the grocery store, we then had do repeat the manufacturing process of the wheelchair (which isn't that difficult, it is merely tedious). So once we were on our way into the store, it just then occurred to me that we needed to have somewhere to put the items we wanted to purchase. What I decided to do was place a small hand basket on Antonia's lap, while putting her arms through the handles.

We were then on our way, piling the groceries up to Antonia's face. But the real trick came when we were finished shopping and had our items placed in grocery bags. This became interesting because we could not put all the groceries on Antonia, so I had to carry some. But when you are pushing a wheelchair, there are big wheels with spokes that come back near the person who is pushing, and this becomes interesting when you have bags in your hand. So a couple of feet from the register and I am soon finding out that plastic bags and spokes aren't good friends.


I remedied the situation by putting the bags into one hand, and pushing with the other. Oh ya, you are probably wondering why I didn't ask for help. Well... because I am ignorant and a male, I didn't think I needed help. But I quickly found out that help would have been a good option. So here I am pushing and maneuvering her wheelchair with one hand, and carrying grocery bags with the other.

We get to the car, I unload the groceries, I unload Antonia, I unassemble the wheelchair, put it in the trunk, and off to our room we go. Five minutes later I reverse the process and try to maneuver our way to our room with a couple extra bags hanging off me that carries my computer and books... because I can't make a second trip and leave Antonia alone.

So here you have a snapshot of how all the details of the trip went in terms of the procedural "issues." However, all went well and we enjoyed ourselves once I accepted the fact that this trip was not going to be anything for me but work.

Antonia had a full check up on the Monday along with a couple of treatments, which open up the blood vessels and allow the stem cells to have better access to the needed areas.


On Wednesday we drove down to Mexico where she received her umbilical stem cells. That went very well and there was not much to the procedure. They drew four vials of blood from her, spun it at high speeds in a centrifuge (which separated the platelets from the rest of the blood), then the platelets were put back into her through the IV, and then the stem cells were place in through the IV. About 40 minutes later after the procedure was over we then were on our way back to our hotel room.


On Friday Antonia then received a stem cell transplant from her own bone marrow. This procedure was much more involved. First of all, Antonia needed to be sedated a little bit in order to make sure she stayed calm, however, she wasn't very affected by the sedation. The doctor couldn't believe her tolerance level and joked with me that she must be an expensive date. He believes it is because the high levels of Depecote she is taking which has her liver working hard and having the ability to detoxify the drug. After extracting five syringes full of her bone marrow blood from inside her hip, the blood was then mixed with a few different stem cell enhancers, and then it was intravenously placed into her blood stream.

After receiving the stem cells we are now in a waiting stage for them to go to the areas of need and then begin to attach themselves so they can repair the damaged cells they are able to get to, and the cells they can become. This process normally takes two to three weeks before results are seen. However, there are cases where affects can be seen earlier, and there are cases when affects are seen later. There are also cases where no improvements were noted.

Please pray with us that God will greatly use these stem cells in order to repair damaged areas and improvement will be noted, so that Antonia will be able to advance in her recovery.

Thank you all for everything,

Dean
PS-Look for new pictures soon coming. Click the "pictures" link.