by Akiim DeShay
I remember the day I was told the chemotherapy wasn’t working. My doctor, who had previously been confident that I would go into remission after the first round of chemo, leaned up against the counter. Rather than standing or sitting directly across from my wife and I, she choose to position herself farther to the right as if to be not fully engaged. I remember as she folded her arms and in a tone I was not used to hearing told me that 40% of by bone marrow was still Leukemia. I remember her telling me that she was referring me to another doctor because my best chance was a bone marrow transplant. I don’t remember much else, because her voice began to fade away although she kept speaking. As reality began to set in I fell deeper and deeper into a trance-like state. It reminded me of the first time another doctor in the ER told me I had Leukemia but this time there were no tears. I went home and lay in the bed and stared into space until I fell asleep.
When I woke up I felt more determined than ever and by the time I went to visit my “bone marrow” doctor as I call him, I was greeted with more disparaging news. In an effort to stay positive I did no research on bone marrow transplants. So I naively believed this would be something that would be offered to me and it would be up to me to decide whether or not I would accept this treatment or choose something else. Needless to say I was foolish. After he described to me what a bone marrow transplant was and I agreed to the procedure he leaned forward in his seat with his elbows almost resting on his knees. While staring me directly in my eyes he revealed to me that it wasn’t really a choice. It was only a possibility. Since I only have one sibling there was only a 25% chance of me finding a matching donor in my family. And that my chances of finding a donor on the national volunteer bone marrow registry was only about 25% because there are not enough African American donors.
For the first time I realized that I had a 75% chance of dying without treatment because I am Black. This was a reality that was hard to swallow. I had to reconsider my mortality and revisit my ‘If I die’ plan of what type of essay or video I would write or record for my newborn son and four year old daughter. What were the most important things they should read or hear from their father who they would have no memories of when they grew up?
Three weeks later while receiving my third round of chemo I remember the phone call and my wife’s words of excitement “She’s a match!” My sister Rashaan was a perfect match. I received my transplant on Good Friday 2004. But after all of that it wasn’t until 2007 when I was forced to revisit the truth for so many others who did not get the same news I did. I volunteered at a bone marrow drive for a preacher who had the same leukemia I did but had no match. This is when I began to think about that 75% figure again and decided to do something about it. By the way, that preacher Pastor Avril Royal never found a match and passed away a year later.
Akiim DeShay is a proud board member of Preserve Our Legacy, INC and runs the web site BlackBoneMarrow.com
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