Day +64

I am fine today. I would continue my talking...

My third brother is working with Petronas in Bintulu. When he heard that I was diagnosed with AML, he immediately grasped his bag and intended to catch the next available flight to visit me in Kuching. His wife reminded him that he had to work night shift that day, and there was no way he could get back to work in time if he went to Kuching. In the end, he came to take care of me in NMSC during his off days.

One of my cousins in Bintangor who is older than me reacted even more aggressively that my third brother. After he knew that I had blood cancer, instead of rushing to Kuching to visit me, he ran away from home and hid in a hut in his pepper garden for almost one week. My aunt had to send him food everyday :-( I have to ask him why he did this when I meet him next time.

At that time, my fourth sister and her husband was joining a church tour oversea. We managed to contact them and they said that the group was praying for me. They brought back some salt from the Dead Dea, which I used to do sitz bath.

She believed in health foods as advocated by natural therapist a lot. So out of concern, she brought me a lot of health foods and nutritional supplements when she came to visit me in NMSC. She even advised me to stop taking solid foods and just to take the very expensive green powder that she brought to me which consists of a mixture of spirulina and other natural ingredients. She was influenced a lot by her friends and always said, "Doctor don't know about nutrition, so don't bother to ask doctor's opinion about this nutritional food." or "Natural food can be taken as much as possible, without causing any harm to your body. The more you take, the better you are." or "Someone took this green powder during chemotherapy, so his hair did not drop." or "You must drink as much fresh fruit and vegetable juice you can, someone's cancer get healed without even going for chemotherapy because they do this."

Anyway, we showed all the health foods and nutritional supplements to the hematologist and he advised me not to take any of them except the vitamins. I know I would be bombarded with all sort of alternative health approaches, herbs, magic health products and all sort of secrete recipes later. So I began to ponder issues related to alternative therapy in NMSC, and finally, I came to some conclusion which I would share with you later.

My third sister, who donated her stem cells to me, also came to take care of me more than one week. My youngest brother, Richard, came and took care of me twice. My first and second brother in Bintangor did not come to visit me, but they were also very concerned about my disease. My mother could not walk well after she experienced a stroke and brain surgery few years back, so she could not take care of me either.

You see, it is good to be in a big family with good relationship among its members. I was accompanied by my family members all the time during my first chemotherapy. I praise God for this :-)

See you next post :-)