Welcome Lee

[Guest guest]

Welcome to our group, Lee. I'm glad you chose us to be your partner in

this CML battle. We have people from every walk of life and every age you can

think of. We stay informed to have a better attitude about CML.

There is man from Greece who wrote recently who was diagnosed 2 days before me

and I never knew that we had another one in the group besides Skip and Bobby who

were around longer than me (with CML - actually in dog years, I am the eldest).

LOL, so it is good to hear from the old timers, allowing us to share our own

journeys and how we got to where we are today. You cannot make an informed

decision with no knowledge, so in this game knowledge knows no bounds. We are

like bloodhounds when it comes to CML we leave no stone unturned or truth

unearthed.

We have in our midst people who have taken part in every trial or taken every

drug after it was approved by FDA. These are your mentors if you want to know

anything about side effects or where they go for treatment, many from large

research centers and some from their hometowns. If they were prescribed

Gleevec, for instance and they were able to move on up the advancement ladder,

there is no reason to change because you may have less side effects with another

drug. Some may have less side effects, but I can say that I have been in 5

trials in the past and 8 different drugs, and they all had side effects for me.

I am hoping when and if I can get into the Ariad trial that I will be one of the

lucky ones who don't have side effects, like Bobby.

Relax, sit back and enjoy the ride with us, we don't take ourselves totally

serious, we laugh the same way we did before and poke fun at each other.

Sometimes it is just a fireside chat, whatever you feel like talking about, but

we are here for each other.

Happy Wednesday,

Lottie Duthu