I never thought too much about my blood when I was younger. When I was a kid, a doctor cauterized some vessels inside my nose to prevent the many nose bleeds I had. When I was working at IBM for 35 years, I was a regular donor of blood. This past summer, my life changed and I began thinking of blood as my body’s life-carrying fluid.
In 2014, I had cancer of the prostate and had it robotically removed. The lab examined some remaining tissues and concluded I still some cancer cells in me. I then had 39 days of radiation. There was no discussion about side effects.
During the summer of 2021, seven years later, we were traveling through Pennsylvania. After a lunch stop, I went to the rest room, and nothing happened. Being unable to urinate brought along great pain. I went to the nearest ER and received a catheter. Upon returning to CT, things got worse and the ER there had me admitted for surgery. The bladder surgery enable the surgeon to cauterize a number of blood vessels. Things were fine for four years. Then came July 7, 2025.
This is when the long stay in the hospital began. My bladder was uncontrollably bleeding despite four surgeries. During the month+ in the hospital various medications infused intravenously. None of the treatments worked. As the days went on, I lost more and more blood and my hemoglobin, which normally has a range of 13.5 to 17.5, declined to 7. This was considered a dangerous level. During the remainder of my hospital time, I had 14 blood transfusions to restore my hemoglobin level.
Hemoglobin delivers oxygen and nutrients to every organ while removing wastes, defending against infection, and helping prevent bleeding through clotting. [1][9][11] Without healthy blood circulation, cells quickly fail and vital organs shut down. [7][9]
Hemoglobin is the iron-rich protein inside red blood cells which binds oxygen in the lungs and releases it to tissues throughout the body, making efficient oxygen transport and energy production possible. Hemoglobin also helps carry carbon dioxide back to the lungs and contributes to maintaining normal blood pH. The bottom line is proper hemoglobin function is essential for survival. When I was discharged from the hospital, my hemoglobin was at 7.9. This is not good, but not dangerous.
Doctors monitored the hemoglobin level weekly and it began to decline almost back to 7.0. It was time for another blood transfusion. Transfusions must be performed meticulously by matching the exact composition of my blood with the blood that would be transfused. My blood is O positive, like 38% of the US population. Fortunately, I have no antibodies in my blood. This made it easier to get a match.
The transfusion took place last week during an hour and a half in the hospital infusion center. As of early this week, my hemoglobin rose to 9.0. This is not ideal, but is adequate. Now I can’t blame low hemoglobin for lack of energy. I need to turn to the right diet and plenty of exercise.
If you want to browse through other posts about the journey, I have created a separate page for an index of them. See link below.
Epilogue – The images of the road to recovery were generated by Perplexity Pro AI for use in my blog. All articles were written by me.