Health scare cannot keep LaPlace man down

Published 12:00 am Saturday, March 30, 2013

By Kimberly Hopson
L’Observateur

LAPLACE – Jerry Wilson is deceptively youthful, both mentally and physically.
The 51-year-old retiree is an avid weight lifter who is full of energy and charisma. You’d never guess by looking at him that he experienced a life-changing brush with death almost four years ago.
“In October 2009, I took real sick. They thought I had the flu. I went to three different hospitals, ended up right here at River Parishes. When I went to the emergency room, the doctor told me I wouldn’t live past two weeks. I had lost 10 pints of blood. I had renal failure,” he said.
Wilson said he stayed in the hospital’s Intensive Care Unit for a week, but still doctors couldn’t figure out exactly what was wrong with him. Three weeks later, another doctor diagnosed him with multiple myeloma, a form of leukemia that affects the plasma cells. More than 90 percent of those diagnosed have this type of myeloma. Wilson said his best friend, Raenell Raphael, and sister, Rhonda, were with him at the time. At the time of the diagnosis, he was already in stage 4 of the disease.
“What it does, it eats up your marrow from the inside. It affects your blood, and it’s usually more common in men in their 60s — I was diagnosed at age 47,” said Wilson.
“I had back pain, which is telling you your kidneys are faiing. I really couldn’t do anything. i couldn’t eat — i lost about 47 pounds in three weeks. i wanted to lose the weight because i was big for my size, but something wasn’t right. I couldn’t raise my hand up above my head or anything. There was a lot of pain and sleep. It tears your blood down, but it makes you tired because you don’t have the proper amount of oxygen in your blood,” he said, explaining his symptoms.
Despite his harrowing diagnosis, Wilson decided he would not let the disease beat him. Wilson said his mother was a key figure in his support system during this time. His response during this downturn was very indicative of his strong character.
“I was like, OK, fine. Let’s fix it so i can get up out of here. It wasn’t anything to get upset about. I’m a fighter,” he said.
Doctors prescribed an oral cancer drug called Revlimid, which put Wilson into remission within three months. Since he was healthy enough, doctors recommended that Wilson have a stem cell transplant. Wilson notes that many older people with the disease cannot handle the stress of the treatment, so it is not a viable option for them.
Wilson said it’s important to know that stem cell treatment has nothing to do with the controversial practice of cloning. Doctors took Wilson’s blood from a port in his chest and extracted 9 million of his own stem cells over the course of four or five days. Wilson described the process, saying that his blood was placed in a centrifuge that spun the cells out. The extracted cells are then placed in a freezer to kill the cancer. While this is going on, the patient is given a large dose of chemotherapy.
The like-new cells are then placed back into the body, where they travel to the bone marrow and reproduce, replacing the normal cells lost during chemotherapy. Wilson said the process is somewhat akin to being reborn.
“It’s just like they’re emptying your body of all impurities. Now your body is just like a little baby’s. You have to have all your immunizations (again). You can’t be around anyone with a cold because you have no platelets or white blood cells. You have to grow all this stuff all over again because the chemo knocks everything out,” he said.
As of this week, Wilson is still cancer free and as active as ever. He currently occupies his time doing odd jobs, lifting weights, heckling friends and singing in the choir at First Community Antioch Church.
“I could not ask for a better church family. Just the church as a whole praying for me, the way things happened with me, it was nothing but God intervening in my life,” said Wilson.