With our travels behind us, we’re now preparing for Paul’s transplant at Stanford. It’s a good thing we took advantage of the window of opportunity to travel over the past couple months, since we won’t be allowed to do any traveling -- or even any socializing -- for several months. Paul’s transplant at Stanford is scheduled for December 12. That will be preceded by several preparatory procedures throughout November and December. This includes two different rounds of heavy-duty chemo, harvesting his stem cells as well as ongoing lab tests to monitor his progress. After the transplant, there will be more procedures lasting into January and possibly February. We will be spending most of our time holed up at home in Berkeley, and the rest of time at Stanford.

At the advice of the medical teams at Stanford and at Kaiser, we won’t be able to have any visitors after October 25. After Paul has fully recovered (probably in February or March), we will be glad and relieved to resume a normal social life. The reason for isolating ourselves is that Paul will be extremely vulnerable to infections before, during and after his transplant. Tim also needs to protect himself, since any germs he might bring home might endanger Paul. Although we won't be able to get together with you in-person, we would still love to "visit" with you via phone calls, emails, texts, Skype, etc. During this time, Paul will have a very structured and restrictive diet. So, along with not having any visitors, we also won’t be able to accept any gifts of food – even ones that are left on our doorstep. (We don't want to be unkind because we really appreciate all your efforts to nurture us -- but, food is off-the-table for now.) Thank you all for your love, support, prayers and good cheer. Please stay in touch.

As we review and schedule all that needs to be done between now and then, Tim met with his Oncologist who advised holding off on further chemotherapy until late December when a repeat PET scan will be done. Depending upon the results of that scan, treatment decisions will be made.