We are already feeling the first signs of the coming fall, cold mornings, mild afternoon temperatures, just a few flowers… It has been “a family” summer, as our daughter and her family visited us from Canada where they are living. It was great to have them at home !

We spent a few days together in “le Perche” in Normandy (https://www.country-lodge.com/). A nice place to be with children, as there are many activities available (taking care of farm animals, swimming pool, biking,tree climbing).

We also went to visit the Eiffel Tower with my grandson. It was among the hotest days of the summer so it was kind of challenging. But we enjoyed the vue of Paris from the first and second levels. As it was the time for the Paris Summer Olympics, we also had a vue of the Beach Volley stadium. My granson was not scarred to walk on the “glass floor”! He gave me his hand to help me :-)!

We also visited with him a science museum (https://science-experiences.com/paris/en/#experience). He is a big fan of volcanoes, and is not scarred by new experiences like virtual reality!

All the family is now back home, and we miss them a lot… We will visit them in October…

September is the time when I have my annual visit with my fantastic graft doctor at Saint Antoine Hospital. Before I will do a full blood analysis to check if everything is OK…

I have been very lucky to have my stem cells graft done in the Hematology Department of the Saint Antoine Hospital in Paris! Great doctors and nurses have taken care of me, and I am now starting my ninth year in my new life! I do not forget my anonymous stem cells donor, and my great family and friends! I love all the members of this first class team: they deserve ” a gold medal”!

June 2016-June 2024: it is the eighth anniversary of my hematopoietic stem cells graft! On June 15th, 2016 I entered room 426 in the Hematology Department at Saint Antoine Hospital in Paris. I was “prepared” to stay there for around 2 months.

During the first week, I had to have a kind of chemotherapy to wipe out my defective hematopoietic stem cells. After a few days, I started to lose my hair, so I asked a nurse to shave my head. I really did not mind, although my wife did not like it :-)!

At this point, visitors noticed a new label on my door: aplasia. No more active hematopoietic stem cells in my body, thus very weak defense against infection… tricky times!

On June 23rd, I was scheduled to receive my new stem cells from my anonymous donor (a young lady from abroad). Unfortunatly for her, she had to have two stem cells samplings, not enough stem cells were present in the first sampling…

June 24th: it took less than one hour for Marie, my nurse of the day, to inject “the good stuff”! It was the first time to do it on her own, so she was extra cautious… Although it was “a very big event”, it was no more than a regular blood transfusion…

After just a few days, my new high quality stem cells started to work efficiently, to such as extent that I moved out to aplasia quickly!

Just less than three weeks after entering my room with a view, the head of the Hematology department paid me a visit and said: well, everything is moving fast in the right direction; what about going back home on, say, July 13th? I was chocked! I was prepared to stay at least two months in the hospital, and after one month I was released!

Going back home, was a big challenge as I was still pretty weak and sensitive to infections. But my wife, my family and my friends took well care of me, so that “I survived” !

Of course, we experienced later some unexpected events, and it was a bumpy road toward full recovery! But here I am, eight years later!

I will never thank enough all the wonderful people who saved me, the doctors and nurses at the hospital (in particular my graft doctor), my anonymous donor, my family, my friends. They are all in my heart forever! I cherish them!

Looking forward to the next anniversary!

With love.

In memory of my father who used to sing this song:

This spring, the weather has not been too good in the Paris area… However, it did not sprevent various plants to bloom: roses, rhododendrons, iris, clematis, columbines…

Here are a few photos taken in my garden over the last few weeks: enjoy!

Voir l’article

In a few weeks, it will be the eighth anniversary of my hematopoietic stem cells graft… time is flying! I do not forget the people who made “this miracle” possible: the team at Saint Antoine Hematology Department and in particular my wonderful graft doctor, my anonymous donor, my great family and my friends… I love them all!

Greetings from Bures-France!

Today, I would like to present one of my hobbies: using “glass” for my “artistic” work! I made several night lights to use both in France and in Canada (the plugs are not the sames!).

The first step is to make a small piece of glass covered with some “drawing”. Using special glass suitable for fusing, I made various objects. The key step is baking at high temperature to almost melt the glass, so that the different pieces are “glued together”….

Here are some examples:

The next step is to glue a small metallic piece to the back of the glass piece using an epoxy glue special glass.

Here comes the tricky part! This piece is not available in France! Why, I don’t know! But it can be bought in Canada! Since I have strong connections with Canada, I was able to buy some from a shop in Quebec! Moreover, I needed another piece to build the night light:

Fortunately, this piece was also available in Canada! So I bought a few of them, and picked them up during one of my trips to Toronto!

The last step was just to connect the two parts together, et voilà!

I am enjoying this “artistic” activity! But now, I need to find a way to get ride of some of them… I already gave some to people in my family, but I saturated all the houses! Maybe, as suggested by friends, I should try to sell them…

Or maybe, offer them to my friends from the Department of Hematology at Saint Antoine Hospital :-)! They saved my life! I love them all, and in particular my great graft doctor! And my donor and family members too!

Back from Toronto! We spent 3 weeks there with our family. It was good to be part of their life! We tried to help as much as possible, so that my daughter and her husband can have some rest. With two young children, and a limited sleeping period, it is kind of hard…

The weather there was as bad as when we left France: rainy and cold! Little sun! Even some snow!

It was just the start of the Spring there, with flowers which were already gone at home but were just starting to bloom.

Back home, we found the same rainy and cold days we had when we left 3 weeks before… But new flowers were blooming…

Soon we will have roses, peonies, iris…

I started again “my artistic work”, both clay modeling and stained glass. Work is in progress…

I am now in my eighth Spring since I got my stem cells graft! I will never thank enough the people at Saint Antoine hospital, and specially my fantastic graft doctor, who made this miracle possible! I don’t forget my anonymous stem cells donor, and my wonderful family and friends! I hope, one day, my anonymous donor will read this blog… I miss her…

With love…

Greetings from Bures-France! We are already in the second week of March: Spring is coming! Although we have had a lot of “bad weather” lately…

I am now in my eighth Spring since I got my stem cells graft! Last week, I had my regular blood analysis: perfect results! I will never thank enough the people at Saint Antoine hospital, and specially my fantastic graft doctor, who made this miracle possible! I don’t forget my anonymous stem cells donor, and my wonderful family and friends! I hope, one day, my anonymous donor will read this blog… I miss her…

Here are some photos taken in my garden… it is still early in Spring, so more photos will come later…

With love

Spring is there (April 7th) with a lot of rain!

Lily of the valley is coming…. one month earlier than May 1st…

During one of the rainy days in Nice, we visited the Chagall Museum. Such a wonderful place! Don’t miss it if you have the chance to visit Nice!

We really enjoyed the visit, although, because of the bad weather, it was kind of crowded…

It was time to go back home. We are looking forward for the next “holidays”, although we, as retired people, are always in vacation :-)!

I would not leave this without saying a big thank you to the people who saved my life almost eight years ago: the doctors and nurses at the Hematology Department of Saint Antoine Hospital, and in particular my fantastic graft doctor, my anonymous stem cells donor, and my great family and friends: I love you all so much! You are always in my heart…

After visiting “les calanques” (a very small part!), we went to Nice, the birth place of my wife! It was the time for “le carnaval”- de Nice”, so we attended it! We also visited the Old Nice, and several small cities along the cost, enjoying a few sunny days! I took also the oportunity to be in a big city, to visit several churches, taking photos of statues of my good friend Saint Antoine :-)!

During our time in Nice, the city experienced the record high rainy day since the year 1945! We used this un pleasant weather to visit the Chagall museum…

Greetings from Bures-France!

Usually, at this time of the year, we become depressed because of the lack of sun in the Paris area. This year, we decided to stay in France, heading for “the South”!

We spent a few days in Marseille to visit “the callanques”. It is a famous area, known to be crowded during the summer. In February, of course, it is not the same!

We have been lucky to enjoy a “good weather”! Here are some photos taken in several calanques:

Enjoy!

This year (2023) has been “a special year”, as my daughter had her second son last september. So, it was difficult for her family to join us in France for Christmas. We decided to move all the family (almost all!) to Toronto instead! We had to find places to accomodate 6 adults, not too fare from where my daughter and her family are living… We succeeded, with the help of some luck!

For Christmas Eve dinner, we tried to keep the traditions alive, but we had to make with the Canadien environment! The goose became a turkey (or parts of a turkey!), the Bertillon ice cream became “a local ice cream”, the smocked salmon and blinis were as good as the usual ones, and we made (my grandson, my daughter and me) a chocolate bûche using a receipe coming from my mother… We had a really great time together!

The main drawback was that we all were looking forward for a white Christmas, but instead we had a wet Christmas :-)! Just before the end of the year, we had some snow, but very little…

We visited a few places in Toronto, mainly places where there were a lot of illuminations. The most stunning place was Casa Loma (https://casaloma.ca/).

Here are some photos taken during our trip:

On the way back, we took our traditional selfie at the airport:

To end up this short story, I would like to dedicate this drawing to the fantastic team of the department of Hematology at Saint Antoine Hospital, and in particular my wonderful graft doctor, to my anonymous stem cells donnor, and my family and friends: I love you all!