World Marrow Donor Day

Yesterday was World marrow donor day. My little skin and blister Gail was my donor and life saver.

We didn’t have it easy when we were kids and were often left to our own devices. As I was the older one my job was always to protect Gail. One day she came home to me crying because one of the local bullies had been picking on her. I came out to see if I could see him. I was eating an apple at the time. When the bully saw me he started to run. I threw my apple at him and it hit him square in the back of his head and took him off his feet. He didn’t pick on Gail again. Lol.

Gail has paid me back many times over by her wonderful and generous gift of her stem cells. The process of her becoming a donor was that she had a blood test to see if she was a match. Once it was confirmed she was compatible she then had some health checks and a talk with a dr to make sure she wasn’t under pressure to donate. After that she had to have GCSF injections for a week. These injections over stimulate the bone marrow to produce extra stem cells.

The harvesting of cells comes next. This was done by Gail being attached to a machine with cannulas in each arm. They took her blood out of one arm, separated the stem cells then gave her back the rest. She had to do this for about 5 hours on 2 consecutive days. The next day I was given the cells they collected.

It’s an amazing process to go through and incredible to think that Gail now also lives inside of me hopefully fixing all my wonky cells.

In the UK people can join the Anthony Nolan register is they are 18-30 and the DKMS register if they are up to 55. The gift of life is one of the most precious things you can give. How amazing it must feel to save a life. Please consider joining the register yourself or encouraging others to do so.

Gail you are a super star and I love you very much. Words could never express all that I feel. I hope you know how special you are! Xx