How I got my new blood type

A personal word in advance. – As a recipient of my voting tips, you may have noticed how sparsely my e-mails had fluttered into your inbox last year. Yes, I had taken some time off – even if not entirely voluntarily. In case you're curious to learn more about the background, read my review.

It was a bright day in June 2015, when I had just taken part in a study at the University Hospital Salzburg and, after half a day of extensive health checks, sat across from the doctor in charge at the final meeting. For several years, the "Paracelsus" study the state of health of the Salzburg population. He praised me for exemplary values from lungs and heart to liver – and then said: "Only, Mr. Fischbacher, we have to take a closer look at this one value!"

Two months later, it was clear that a biochemical process had derailed in my hematopoietic system due to a "spontaneous gene mutation", completely unnoticed by my dazzling general condition. In "this very special juice", my blood, there were a threatening number of platelets swimming.

"At the moment, Mr. Fischbacher, this can be adjusted with medication" said my attending physician in the clinic and looked at me briefly and examined, as if he wanted to assess how openly he could talk to me. "In the long term, however, your illness is life-threatening!"

Perhaps you know stories of such moments from your own experience or from your circle of friends. After all, my doctor hadn't said "cancer", but no matter, even though I had never heard the name of my disease before and have a lot of faith in modern medicine – after "life-threatening!" I felt a good adrenaline rush. "Interesting", said the communication coach in me: "He has now conveyed the message surprisingly openly and clearly. And I took note of it surprisingly soberly."

The decisive news electrified me a bit: "In about two years, the right time is for your only cure, a blood stem cell transplant."

While I worked from autumn 2015 to autumn 2017 held countless seminars, gave lectures and supported coaching clients, preparations for Day X were running in the background. The day of the transplant. About the International donor database a suitable donor was found in Berlin, an essential prerequisite for the success of the treatment.

At every subsequent pharmacy visit, I thanked the Austrian social security system. Never again will I mock high contributions in conversations with colleagues. Did you know that there is a separate term for particularly rare diseases? And a dedicated action plan for the development and financing of drugs for this "Orphan Disease" ?

On November 5, 2017, the time had come: I checked in at the KMT department of the University Hospital Graz. Ten days later, "Day Zero" was to clarify whether the blood stem cells of the anonymous Berlin donor would be welcomed by my organism – and whether I would survive the procedure. That sounds very dramatic now, but it corresponded to the naked medical facts.

What exactly is meant by the term "blood stem cell transplantation"? I will spare you the details of the treatment, but this much can be said: In the first nine days, the recipient is prepared for the transplant. By means of special chemotherapy, the patient's own blood production is destroyed, instead of which the new stem cells are to work later. At the same time, the immune system is reduced to almost zero so that the donor cells are not rejected. All this takes place in a hermetically sealed hospital room with special ventilation, entry to the department is only possible through an airlock, doctors and nurses wear breathing masks. What I have learned as a voice coach from these weeks, in which the voices of people spoke to me whose faces I could only see their eyes, I will report on in a next blog post.

On day 10, the day of the transfusion , the tension was already palpable in the morning: Early in the morning, my donor in Berlin had offered his valuable stem cells by blood washing. With blue lights, the cool box with the two infusion bags went to the airport, with blue lights the Graz ambulance rushed from the airport to the clinic. Around 1:00 p.m. the time had come. Under the scrutiny of all the doctors involved and connected to countless beeping sensors, I received my life-saving cells by infusion.

Many of you know that I have been working with natural healers ("curanderos") from the Peruvian Amazon lowlands for more than two decades and have learned a lot about natural medicine from them during my travels. However, this will never stop me from appreciating the seriousness and research achievements of modern medicine. I was able to see how more than twenty years of international experience flow into a single treatment. The methodological competence, the know-how, but also the human warmth that I experienced during my stay in the clinic made a deep impression on me.

In the weeks before my stay in the clinic, I had made many organizational arrangements for my long absence. I was aware that as a self-employed service provider, I would not be able to make any sales for months. In order to survive economically, I therefore reduced costs at all corners and, particularly painfully, ended the employment relationship with my long-time assistant. It's interesting how many cherished things, habits that have become self-evident and apparent requirements you can part with when things are really serious.

With four months of absence for health reasons of seminar rooms, lecture halls and coaching studios. I had cancelled all appointments arranged long before and experienced a lot of understanding from my customers, for which I would like to thank you once again! But already during my six-week stay in the Graz clinic, I realized that this assumption was far too optimistic. It was not until September of last year that I was recovered enough to take the first tentative steps back into the profession. But once again, an infection brought me back into quarantine. Only now, at the beginning of February 2019, do I return to my usual life after a fourteen-month interruption, completely healthy and strengthened again.

It does not go unnoticed by you: Since I can tell you personally about my experiences today, the Graz team around Prof. Dr. Neumeister and Dr. Huber-Krassnitzer has done wonderful and successful work. My organism has absorbed the new blood stem cells without resistance, they have found a place in my bone marrow and now supply me with healthy blood, just as if nothing had happened.

Only my new blood type A0 will remind me of the dramatic hours, days and weeks in the Graz clinic for the rest of my life.

Now I am looking forward to everything we will experience together around voice and performance.

You

Arno Fischbacher

 

Free video series: Use your voice for more success!

The voice and its psychological tricks: Use your voice for more success! Learn supposedly small things with a big impact.

 

P.S.: I'm happy if you like this post. If so, please share it on one of your networks! Do you have a question or would you like to discuss my thoughts with me? Write a comment! I look forward to hearing your opinion!