Bruising like a grape

Just a quick update about one of the side-effects of Revlimid.  I banged my hip against my desk a couple of weeks ago and a GNARLY bruise resulted.  I mean at its peak this thing was at least six inches in diameter and covered the whole right side of my hip.  Yuck.  I was going to take a picture of it and post it here but frankly, neither you nor I really want to see that immortalized for future search engines to find!  :)

My platelets were around 110.  I graphed this at one point for my own edification and should put it up here.  On maintenance there is a short cycle where while one is on Revlimid for the 21 days, the platelets decrease, and during the week that one is off it, they creep back up.  They might, for example, be at 150 at the start of the month, go down to 110 by the end of the 21 days, and go back up to 150 at the end of the 18 days.

Two further points, though.  The first is that they lag a little bit so they seem to continue to go up during the first few days (say the first 7 of the 21) of the month and then continue to go down even when one is no longer taking the Revlimid for a few days.

The second, bigger point is that over time they don't go up by as much as they go down.  I would say my baseline has probably dropped from 125 to maybe 110 over the last year.  And that is slightly troubling since I'm on this stuff for another 18 months or so and I will be well below 100 on a regular basis, and that's when the gnarly bruising starts.

I asked BB if I could take a week off from the Revlimid to give the marrow a chance to recover and hopefully have that bruise vanish.  He agreed, thankfully.  So the bruise is starting to get better.  But today is my last day off.  Blech.

Be well, everyone!  I am scheduled to return to Arkansas on the 16th of May but will have updates before then.