Marrowforums - I'm Sweet 16 (years since transplant)!

Dear Friends,

The 16th anniversary of my matched unrelated donor bone marrow transplant for MDS was October 6. While I try to post on that day to let you all know how I’m doing, this time I was off in Las Vegas working hard at a conference (and playing a little, too).

Last year, on my 15th anniversary, my transplant doctor dismissed me as a patient (see my post). Since then I have continued to be impressed by the efforts of so many patients, families, and organizations that are actively spreading the word about bone marrow failure diseases and raising funds to support research that will ultimately bring us cures.

Although I never like to hear that anyone has been diagnosed with aplastic anemia, MDS, or PNH, the publicity surrounding ABC’s Good Morning America co-host Robin Roberts’ transplant for MDS in 2012 and her subsequent recovery and return to work brought a lot of attention to our rare diseases. So have events like the AA&MDSIF’s Hope, Steps & A Cure walk/runs, which have been held in 11 cities, including Austin, Houston, Indianapolis, Los Angeles, Milwaukee, New Philadelphia (OH), Phoenix, South River, Spokane, San Antonio, and Washington DC.

The world’s exposure to our cause will get a further boost on November 19th when the AA&MDSIF will be the featured charity on the Groupon Coupon website! Groupon Coupon will help us all by spreading awareness about bone marrow failure diseases and link visitors to the Foundation’s website. For every purchase of a Groupon Coupon on November 19, the AA&MDSIF will receive a portion of the proceeds.

I am grateful to everyone who has helped me get to this milestone anniversary—family, friends, doctors, nurses and my very special bone marrow donor. But the fact that more than 650 new people have registered at Marrowforums in the past year, and that Marrowforums members have made over 4,800 new forum posts in that time, tells me that our work is not nearly done. I’m going to keep doing what I can to support the fight against bone marrow failure diseases, and I hope you will too.

Regards to all,
Ruth

P.S. Thanks to those of you who posted this week in the thread for my 9th anniversary. I don’t know how that thread came up, but your kind words mean a lot to me no matter where they come from!