INPUT ARTICLE: Article: Medication like Neupogen can help to raise your neutrophil levels, especially if you are undergoing treatment for cancer. Your doctor can give you this medication with an injection or through an IV. You may receive it daily if your neutrophil levels are very low and you are undergoing chemotherapy. You may experience side effects like nausea, fever, bone pain, and back pain while on this medication. Neutropenia can be caused by other conditions like a bacterial infection or a virus. Your doctor may treat these issues by hospitalizing you and giving you antibiotics to treat the underlying infection. Once the infection clears up, your neutrophil levels should return to normal. If your low neutrophil levels are due to a disease like leukemia or aplastic anemia, your doctor may suggest a bone marrow transplant. The transplant is done by removing diseased bone marrow and replacing it with healthy bone marrow from a donor. You will be under general anesthesia during the procedure. You may need to take medication before and after you have the bone marrow transplant to ensure the infection is gone and your neutrophil levels are back to normal.

SUMMARY: Ask your doctor for a prescription for neutrophil-boosting medication. Ask your doctor if other conditions are affecting your neutrophil levels. Get a bone marrow transplant if your condition becomes severe.


INPUT ARTICLE: Article: It is easy to focus on the things that you do not like about yourself or the areas that need improvement. When you focus on the negative, you forget about all the other wonderful attributes you have.  It is important that you acknowledge the things that you are good at and make time to do those things.  Examples of good qualities you may have include being smart, funny, kind, generous, creative, loving, caring, etc. Talents and skills you may have include being an athlete, dancer, musician, writer, artist, poet, singer, volunteer, etc. How much time do you spend doing these any of these activities? How will you make these activities part of your everyday life? A lack of confidence can stop you from trying something new or doing something that you enjoy. What would you do if you had more confidence? What is stopping you from doing it?  Write down the following sentence, "If I had more confidence, I would..." What type of support or encouragement would you need to try this? How would you feel if you actually tried this? For example, maybe you are a good writer and would like to work on your skills. However, you are not confident enough to write for your school newspaper. You may write,  "If I had more confidence, I would join my my school newspaper. I know that I am a solid writer, but I am afraid of other people reading my work. If I joined the newspaper, I would become a better writer and make new friends." Every person has strengths and weaknesses. These are different for each and every girl. When you compare yourself, you are often comparing a weakness you have to someone else's strength. If you continue to do this, you will never feel good about yourself.  When you find yourself comparing yourself to another person, direct your attention back to yourself. Remind yourself that you are unique and have your own strengths and talents. Go back and read the list of positive attributes, talents, and skills that you made. It may help to post the list by your bed or on your bathroom mirror. There may be areas that you would like to improve upon or things you would like to accomplish. When you achieve things, you prove to yourself that you can meet expectations. Setting a goal and achieving it can help build your confidence.  Write down your goal and then write down steps you can actually take to achieve it. Your goals and the steps you take should be realistic. Setting a goal that you are unable to reach may backfire and make you feel worse. For example, if you want to start running, running a 5k is a better goal than running a half-marathon. Trying to go from not running very often to running a half marathon is a huge jump, and you are setting yourself up for failure. A 5k is very realistic, and you can find a couch to 5k running program to help you set your daily and weekly goals.

SUMMARY:
Write down your talents, skills, and good qualities. Challenge yourself to do more. Stop comparing yourself to other people. Set goals for yourself.