How do I implement a timeout / wait for an NSStream to effectively make method synchronous

I have an input stream and output stream for a bluetooth connected accessory

I want to achieve the following:

write data to outputStream wait until data received on inputStream OR until 10 seconds pass if inputStream data arrived return data else return nil

I tried to implement this like so:

- (APDUResponse *)sendCommandAndWaitForResponse:(NSData *)request {
  APDUResponse * result;
  if (!deviceIsBusy && request != Nil) {
    deviceIsBusy = YES;
    timedOut = NO;
    responseReceived = NO;
    if ([[mySes outputStream] hasSpaceAvailable]) {
      [NSThread detachNewThreadSelector:@selector(startTimeout) toTarget:self withObject:nil];
      [[mySes outputStream] write:[request bytes] maxLength:[request length]];
      while (!timedOut && !responseReceived) {
        sleep(2);
        NSLog(@"tick");
      }
      if (responseReceived && response !=nil) {
        result = response;
        response = nil;
      }
      [myTimer invalidate];
      myTimer = nil;
    }
  }
  deviceIsBusy = NO;
  return result;
}

- (void) startTimeout {
  NSLog(@"start Timeout");
  myTimer = [NSTimer timerWithTimeInterval:10.0 target:self selector:@selector(timerFireMethod:) userInfo:nil repeats:YES];
  [[NSRunLoop currentRunLoop] addTimer:myTimer forMode:NSRunLoopCommonModes];
}

- (void)timerFireMethod:(NSTimer *)timer {
  NSLog(@"fired");
  timedOut = YES;
}

- (void)stream:(NSStream*)stream handleEvent:(NSStreamEvent)streamEvent
{
  switch (streamEvent)
  {
    case NSStreamEventHasBytesAvailable:
      // Process the incoming stream data.
      if(stream == [mySes inputStream])
      {
        uint8_t buf[1024];
        unsigned int len = 0;
        len = [[mySes inputStream] read:buf maxLength:1024];
        if(len) {
          _data = [[NSMutableData alloc] init];
          [_data appendBytes:(const void *)buf length:len];
          NSLog(@"Response: %@", [_data description]);
          response = [[APDUResponse alloc] initWithData:_data];
          responseReceived = YES;
        } else {
          NSLog(@"no buffer!");
        }
      }
      break;
     ... //code not relevant 
  }
}

So the theory was to have an NSTimer running on a separate thread that would set a boolean when it fired, then also have the handleEvent delegate method set another boolean if data is received. In the method we have a while loop with a sleep that will cease when one of these bools is set.

The problem I am having is that in the 'timeout scenario' my timerFireMethod is not getting called. My gut feeling is that I am not actually correctly setting the timer on a separate thread.

Can anyone see what is going wrong here or suggest a better implementation for the requirement above?