Sweet Swedes

Jeff’s hospital stay this month cost him valuable time in completing the little cherry tables he was making - a wedding gift for my nephew and his wife (Mr. and Mrs. Claus) and another for his bone marrow donor, Nicole.  We’d been planning to deliver the two gifts on a road trip to Nicole’s home near Atlanta, Georgia, with a side trip to the Claus home in Greenville, North Carolina.  The swelling in Jeff’s leg was showing no sign of improvement and I assured him that we could make the trip without the tables and deliver them at some future date, if necessary. 

Jeff was highly motivated to complete the projects and his recuperation was centered around what he felt able to do each day in order to get the job done.  Kim offered a day’s help and the two of them got the tables assembled and ready for finish.  Jeff applied the finish coats with only just enough drying time before our departure.

We are still glowing with the love shown to us by Nicole and her beautiful family.  Nicole and her husband, Scott, opened their hearts and home to us and we instantly felt as though we were visiting family.  In fact, we saw actual relatives, too.  Jeff’s cousin, Phil and his wife, Lori, live in the Atlanta area and they joined us at the Georgia Aquarium on Saturday.  Their daughter, Piper, and Olivia got along great and the two young families found that they had a lot of common interests.  The aquarium provided excellent photo opportunities and my phone was busy all day capturing the fun and, we’ve been told, pictures of Jeff and Nicole looking like siblings or cousins.

Nicole and Scott hosted a dinner party on Sunday so that we could meet Nicole’s family.  They had walked with Nicole during the bone marrow donation process and it was fascinating to hear more about the experience from their perspectives.  We met Nicole’s Aunt Janine whose loss of her sweet baby Nicholas when Nicole was a teenager inspired Nicole’s involvement with Team in Training and ultimately inspired her to swab her cheek for the Gift of Life bone marrow registry.  Janine and I blubbered in each other’s arms before getting to know a little bit about each other’s caregiving experiences.  Janine shared a photo album of Nicholas, some pictures showing a happy, healthy boy, and others while he was in treatment – still happy.

We met Nicole’s Aunt Karen who thankfully had not moved from the address Nicole listed on her bone marrow registry paperwork (all her other contacts had moved!).  Karen honored little Nicholas by bringing M&M’s, a favorite candy of his. 

As I suspected, Nicole’s mother, Debbie, had some misgivings about Nicole donating marrow.  She worried about Nicole’s health since she had given birth to Olivia barely a year earlier.  Still, Debbie would not dissuade her daughter from doing something she’d decided to do and she accompanied Nicole to New York for the pre-transplant testing and again for the actual donation.  Debbie was alone for most of the two and half hours that Nicole was under general anesthesia - a very stressful time, indeed. 

Nicole’s grandmother and other family members asked questions about Jeff’s experience and how he is feeling now.  I think it was surprising to them to learn that Jeff’s chimerism tests show his blood is 100% produced by Nicole’s marrow.  Jeff refers to the education we have gotten as a result of his illness as “Biology 101.”  We shared a little of our enhanced, practical “Biology 101” education.  For all the science involved, it is still a miracle that Nicole’s marrow, collected in a NY hospital and delivered in a plastic bag to the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, dripped into a Hickman catheter in Jeff’s chest over a four-hour period, then found its way to where it needed to go to begin making blood, and that it continues to make healthy blood today.  They seemed to share our awe and our joy and we are very glad to have met them.

Since ethnicity matters in bone marrow transplantation, we were interested to hear about Nicole’s ancestry.  While Jeff is German-Irish-French, Nicole is Swedish-Polish-French.  Fascinating!  We learned that Nicole’s great-grandmother lived to age 93.  I think that bodes well for Jeff’s longevity!

We loved being honorary members of the family and enjoyed staying in Nicole and Scott’s beautiful home.  Nicole and Scott are good parents and their home is a joyful one.  We were treated to an earnest rendition of “Let it Go” from Frozen by guitar-toting 5-year-old Olivia.  On our last evening we gathered on Olivia’s bed while 7-year-old Evan read The Butterfly and the Carpenter Bee, the book we wrote for the children to show them what their mother’s gift means to us.  It was beautifully read and I can’t believe I didn’t cry.

We had an easy two-day return trip to Pennsylvania.  We traveled on a Monday holiday (President’s Day) so traffic was light.  It snowed overnight Monday night so schools, businesses and the federal government were closed on Tuesday.  Again traffic was light and the roads clear and dry.  We got home early Tuesday evening with ample time to crank up the snowblower.  I texted Nicole:  a picture of Jeff at the machine, snow flying, with the caption, “Georgia on our minds.”  Having met Jeff’s blood sister, we will always feel a tug south.  We look forward to hosting them sometime soon and continuing our quasi-familial, serendipitous relationship.