Phlebotomy aka blood letting

 Yesterday, I spent my afternoon at the infusion lab at Rocky Mountain Cancer Center. I have way too much iron in my blood because from the several blood transfusions that I have had. Doctors didn’t want to deal with this while fighting my leukemia so they are now. Every month, they draw my blood to check my iron level, if it’s high, I have to do a phlebotomy. Basically, phlebotomy is a fancy word for blood letting. I get hooked up with a big needle which is used to drain my blood. The procedure takes about thirty minutes and then they throw my blood away! The first time they tried, I got lightheaded and really hot so they had to stop. Now after draining me, they pump fluids through the IV.

When I was getting chemo, I would stay in the hospital for the weekend to get the chemo and once done they would discharge me. The following week, I would go to the infusion lab, where they would give me blood or fluids based on daily lab results. Chemotherapy is so hard on the body, requiring me to spend hours being replenished at the infusion lab. Needless to say, being in an infusion lab brings back bad memories.

That’s the thing about cancer, even in remission, I’m still dealing with the effects.

I took a picture to show how big the needle was. If you are afraid of needles, don’t look at the picture. I also took a picture of my view, at least that was nice.