I haven't posted all week about the diagnosis I got for Shannon. I'm not sure how I feel so I didn't know what to say. But, for those three or four people who actually read this blog, I guess I should update you. ...LIPOSARCOMA... and, yes, for those who don't know, that is the big C--cancer. I've been trying to stay upbeat, and there is good news with that diagnosis. Liposarcoma is a cancer of the fatty cells inside tissue. It is fairly rare in animals, but is more common in dogs than cats. Tumors form which can be invasive. The good thing about this particular cancer, if there can be a good thing about cancer, is that while it commonly re-occurs at the excision site, it rarely metastasizes. In other words, it doesn't usually spread. And since the location that Shannon has it is on her leg, it isn't likely to be a life-threatening cancer. But we will probably be repeating this week on more occasions. Shannon has actually been great about the whole thing. Because the bandage covered her whole leg, she couldn't bend at the 'wrist' joint. So, she was limping and I was carrying her down any stairs, mostly because I was nervous that she wouldn't be able to maintain her balance. She quickly figured out how to go up the stairs, how to jump up onto her chair and how to get waited upon hand and foot. We went back to the vet's office, yesterday, to have the bandage removed and the wound inspected. It was the first time I saw it and it looks nasty. A bunch of stitches up her leg, which I think were purple. The vet said that everything looked good and just put a light bandage over it. We go back on Sunday afternoon to get the stitches removed. And if the vet OKs it, she's getting a bath afterwards.
It's been a while since I've post. It isn't because there hasn't been anything going on in my life. More like the total opposite and I just didn't feel up to posting about it. My last post I mentioned that Shannon had been feeling a little under the weather. Well, the last month has seen me at the vet's office way too often for my liking. It started out with Shannon refusing to eat. She turned her nose up at everything. For a living garbage disposal this was worrying. I could get her take some food with a great deal of coaxing, but she wasn't enthusiastic. After about a week of this, I decided that a visit to the vet was in order. He couldn't find anything wrong, but because of her various medical problems, he ordered a complete blood workup and also an EKG and x-rays to see if her heart had worsened. So the next day, I took the day off of work and dropped her off in the morning. Back in the early afternoon for a report that her heart, while not better, was not worse but she had an elevated white blood cell count and slightly elevated kidney numbers. I get sent home with a week's worth of antibiotics and an appointment to come back in about ten days. By the second day of the antibiotics, she seemed to be feeling a lot better. More interest in food and in life in general. The following Friday, another day off from work, and we went back to the vet just for a recheck on the bloodwork to see if the infection was gone and to see if the kidney numbers stayed the same. Totally routine. The vet tells me to call back on Sunday for the results. I'm not sure why, but Saturday night I notice a lump on her front leg. I had not noticed this before and it's about the size of a grape. Because of her age, she has a number of little masses on her body. They're more than likely fatty deposits and the vet's reaction is to just note them and make sure they don't get larger. But this mass was different. I could just tell. It was big and not roundish like the others and, it must have developed quickly if I had not previously noticed it. I spent Saturday night awake and in a bit of a panic. Sunday morning was torture. Waiting until about 10:30 when the vet told me to call seemed to take forever. Finally, it arrived and I phoned him. He told me that the white blood cell count was still elevated and I mentioned the mass on her leg. He told me to bring her right in. After an examination, the doctor shared my concern. He told me that he'd give me another weeks worth of antibiotics and to keep an eye on the leg. I was to come back in a week and we would decide where to go from there. Let me just tell you, that mass seemed huge for the whole week. I can't imagine how I had missed it previously. It seemed to pull my eye to it every time I looked at her. Meanwhile, she's feeling fine. Totally normal. Eating like she hadn't seen food in weeks. Monday night I manage to get a quick run in to try and relax and work off some of the tension. Another day off of work and back to the vet on Tuesday of the next week. (There are some perks to being a civil servant). I had been imagining the worst for the past week and my heart is in my throat and I'm exhausted when we go to the animal hospital. After a quick exam and the decision that the mass has not changed significantly (the vet was hoping that it was related to the mystery infection)they take blood again and we make plans for surgery the next day. Wednesday is another day off of work and she gets dropped off at the animal hospital at 10:30am with instructions to call back at 3pm if I don't hear from them sooner. I just wandered around for the next couple of hours, not knowing what to do with myself. At 3:05 I phoned the hospital. The vet told me that she was awake and alert and the surgery had gone well. He felt that he had removed the entire tumor and it had been sent off to the lab for a biopsy. She had an IV and a bandage. He wanted to keep her overnight to make sure everything was alright and I could pick her up the next day. I was elated but a little disappointed as I wanted her home NOW. I got another run in. With everything going on, I actually managed to get in all my runs this past week for the first time in a while. I got the best night's sleep that night since I didn't have to worry about Shannon. My original plan was to go to work and leave early when I got the OK to pick her up, but I decided after getting completely ready for work and actually beginning my commute that there was no way I could deal with work that day, so I turned around and went home. I called the animal hospital at 11 to see if I could pick her up and they told me to come over in about an hour so they would have time to bandage her leg. One hour later, exactly, I was in the waiting room looking for my puppy. We decided against the conehead collar since the bandage was similar to the cast she had last fall and she hadn't bothered that. She's back on antibiotics again and limping around. The opposite front leg was also shaved, for the IV, I assume. The biopsy on the tumor won't be back until Monday, but I'm not worrying about it. I don't think it will make much of a difference either way. I'm just glad she's home.
Well, even though I promise myself I'm not going to let the blog get away from me again, it inevitably does. I have been kind of busy, for me. Which means that I haven't spent 5 days a week sitting on my sofa watching TV. I am now on the board of my running club, have also volunteered to maintain the website and am on our race committee. This means that beside running with the club, I also attend various meetings at night. I feel positively active. To see the website go here Alley Pond Striders Our race, which is a fun and tough 5 miler that I hope anyone reading in the NYC area comes out for, is going to happen on April 27. The link for online registration is here Alley Pond 5 Mile Challenge Shannon feels great. Her leg is almost back to normal. Someone who didn't know her would probably barely be able to tell, except when she is tired or just getting up from a nap. Then it is a little stiff. The one thing that hasn't got back to normal is her ability to jump up onto things. She can't make it up onto my bed. I bought those steps for her, but she refuses to use them. Instead, she stands next to the bed and whines for me to lift her. I did find her on her chair this week, though, which means she is jumping a little. Oh, I got a couple of late Christmas gifts this week - one from my sister and one from Chelly. My sister sent the cool sunglasses on the right They're by Rudy Project and can accept prescription lenses. I haven't got the lenses, yet. I'm waiting because I'm considering getting vision correction surgery. Has anyone had that done? I have to find out if I'm even a candidate, but I seriously thinking about it. If I can't get it, I'll have to look into getting lenses that fit the frame. Chelly constructed a scrapbook of our NY Half-Marathon by Nike experience last summer. It's really cool. She combined our experiences, as expressed on our blogs, with photos of various points of the course. The book also includes the experience of Adam, a friend of hers. Well, I have to get back to the Giant game.
Well, the big news around here is that Shannon got her cast off! I brought her in to the vet's on Monday for what I thought was just going to be a quick look to see how things were going. The vet looked at it and said it was coming off. Fantastic! It took quite a bit of cutting and tugging, but the thing was removed and I was sent home with what seemed like a very tiny dog with an itty-bitty leg. The vet warned me that it would probably take a day or two before she started to use it. I've never had a cast, but he said that the limb feels odd for a while after you get one off. I was just happy to not have that huge thing hanging off of her. The first night she was confused. She had gotten used to using the cast to support her weight and now there was nothing there. So she spent most of the time lying on her cushion. By the next day she was touching the foot to the ground, but the leg was very weak. The vet didn't give any special instructions, but I tried to force her to use it a little. By the evening she was getting around, mostly using the foot to balance herself rather than hold her weight. I spoke to the vet on Wednesday morning. I was a little down about how little she was using it, but he didn't seem too concerned. He said to give it another 36 hours and we'd see how it goes. I called him back on Friday morning and told him that it didn't really seem any better. I'd say she was limping about as badly as before we bandaged the leg. He wasn't too happy and said that it usually worked better, especially with the small dogs. We discussed the possibility of surgery. He's not too inclined to do it and I don't really want to put her through it either. He said that it wouldn't make much difference if we did the surgery now or later. So I decided we'd wait and see how things go. When I got home it was like she had heard the decision and decided she didn't want surgery, either. She is using the leg about 90 percent of the time. She is still limping, but I think the limp is not as bad as it was before. I'm really hoping there will be further improvement. We went for our first walk in about a month this morning. I think she was thrilled to get off of the front lawn. We didn't go too far since she is probably out of shape. I did carry her the last bit, but I think she was happy to get out. Here's keeping our fingers crossed for her.
Well, this week has sucked, big time. It should have been great, starting with a long weekend as it did. But, except for Saturday, which was OK, it has really been a stinker. I'll start off by saying I went for an easy 4 mile run on Saturday morning. Pretty slow for me at an 11:15 pace, but I hadn't been for a run in almost two weeks and I let a generally slower runner in the club just carry me along. I wasn't disappointed - it felt good, with no pain or difficulty. I didn't have any particular plans for the weekend. I was probably just going to hang out, maybe do some cleaning since I was so busy last weekend and hadn't been picking up after myself. The really bad stuff started when Shannon, who has been a bit reluctant to jump up onto things, actually started to have a definite limp in one of her hind legs. I looked and poked and didn't see a definite injury. She just didn't want to put her full weight on that leg. It seemed to get better as the day went on, but was worse when she just got up from a lie down. I thought perhaps it was a touch of arthritis. I spent most of the weekend going back and forth about seeing the vet. We were just there two weeks ago for a sonagram on her heart. It was bad news. Her heart is worse than it was six months ago. But she isn't really showing any symptoms, so the vet is not recommending anything yet. I just wasn't ready to get another serious diagnosis and was hoping it would just resolve itself. Sunday I woke up feeling like death warmed over. My head was pounding and I had a sore throat. Just great. The same thing happened over my last three day weekend. I think I'm doomed to spend my holiday breaks with some kind of nasty bug. I spent most of the day lying on the couch and catching up with some of the television shows I've recorded on the DVR. So after a full day of feeling awful, I took Shannon out for her evening walk. She was feeling peppy even though she was still limping. But when I wasn't paying attention, she saw one of the local feral cats that she likes to chase. She took off like she totally forgot her leg hurt. When she stopped, her left hind leg was hanging. After a minute, she started to use it again, but it was definitely worse. I called the vet Monday morning and they had me come right over. After an exam, I was told she had probably torn or damaged her cranial cruciate ligament, which is a similar injury to the ACL injury that football players are always getting. The vet explained that they would do an x-ray to confirm, but that was what he thought was wrong. There were two roads for treatment. The more conservative one would entail wrapping her leg in a bandage splint for 4 - 6 weeks to immobilize the leg. At the end of that time, hopefully, the ligament would have repaired itself. This method would be easier on her but probably would not result in 100% use of the leg. The other choice is surgery. From what I've read, this has a better chance for full recovery of the leg, but would take months and is, obviously, much harder on the dog. The vet felt that the bandage was a better option and if it didn't work, we could always consider surgery later. So Shannon spent the night at the hospital, since they had to sedate her to do the bandage and the vet wanted to keep her under observation to see how she reacted to the cast. She came home yesterday morning and I've been a nervous wreck since. I've had to watch her to make sure that she doesn't hurt herself while she gets used to maneuvering the cast through the apartment. I also have to watch her to keep her from jumping onto or off of things. So I've now taken an additional two days off of work, but haven't really been enjoying my 'vacation'. I'm still sick and now I'm exhausted. She's not happy and has a tendency to stand and sway in the middle of the room while whining. She wants up on the couch and on her chair, but then I worry that she will hurt herself trying to get off. I really hope this works, because if it doesn't I don't think I can take the additional recovery time that will come with the surgery.
Today was the North Fork Bank Trail Relay. I ran this one last year and I had a blast, so I was back again for another go. We actually had more people show up. Probably was due to the ten degree increase in the temperature over last year. My team was made up of Sue, Christina and myself - we called ourselves the Stridettes. That's Laferne sticking her head into the photo over my shoulder. She's in my running club, but was running with another team. I ran the first two mile leg in a pretty respectable 16:40 and tagged Christina as I came in. The trails were pretty good, but there was some ice and you had to watch out for a few sections where vehicles and walkers had made indentations that froze into ankle-twisting obstacles.
After I finished my leg I grabbed a cup of water and got my bag so I could take some pictures. I was just wandering around when one of the guys in my club came up to me and told me that I was going to have to run again. Huh? Did something happen to our anchor runner? Nope. One of the other teams was short a guy who didn't show up. So we quickly pinned the other teams number over my number and I headed for the exchange area to be ready for their middle runner, Lachlan. I was freezing as I stood there and in the rush I had left my gloves in my jacket pocket, which was back on a picnic table near the refreshment area. I contemplated going back to get them, but I had no idea how fast this team was running and I didn't want to miss my tag, especially since he had no idea I was doing the anchor leg for his team.
Soon enough Lachlan came through. I yelled for him and we ran together for a few dozen feet as he handed off to me their anchor number. Then I was off into the woods for another go at the course. I had a tough time. The first time through I ran pretty hard because I knew I was only going to have to run two miles. I had a lot less left in the tank this time around. I managed to get the second two miles in about 17:30. Not too shabby all things considered. Their team was pretty happy with it and Lachlan confided that it was probably faster than the guy I was replacing. It was a good thing it wasn't spectacular, because technically we were a Men's Masters team and I'm not a man :-)
Shannon has been feeling OK today. She's seems to have ups and downs. Last night I thought I might be going to the vet today instead of the race. But her spirits are up today, although she is coughing a little and her breathing is somewhat labored. I'm not sure, yet, what warrants rushing back to the doctor. I don't think there has been enough time for all the new meds to kick in, so perhaps that will improve things. She is due to go back the middle of this week, anyway, for further tests to see how she is handling the heart medication she is on. I'm torn and I feel guilty. You can imagine this is costing quite a bit and, while money is no object if it makes her feel better, I would like to save where I can. The less I spend now, the more I have later. But a part of me feels bad even including money in the equation as I decide whether to take her in for a vet visit.
Well, Shannon is home and the news is mixed. She was in serious trouble Sunday when she went to the vet. She had been listless, coughing for a few days and it seemed her breathing was kind of labored, so I decided to check things out. I was thinking some kind of upper respiratory infection or, perhaps, kennel cough. However, the vet determined that she had a very loud heart murmur and really bad chest sounds, so she decided to take an x-ray. It turned out that there was fluid around her heart and something going on in her lungs. She was immediately put on oxygen and received antibiotics and a diuretic to try and relieve the fluid accumulation. She had to stay overnight for observation and the vet said that she wanted to do an echocardiogram to see what was going on with her heart. But first she had to feel better.
Monday morning I called the vet's office to see what was happening. I was told that she was much improved and that she could come home that day, but she was going to have to come back on Tuesday for the echo. Tuesday, I dropped her off on my way to work. Then I spent half the day useless because all I could think about was my puppy. I got a call at lunchtime with the results. Early stage heart disease with a whole list of stuff about her mitral valves and ventricles which mostly just went right through my head. I latched onto the word mild and went with that. She's going to have to take heart medication and go for further testing to see how it is working. The vet is also concerned about her kidney results and wants to do an ultrasound to see what is going on there. I'm really having difficulty digesting all this information. I'm just hanging onto the reassurances from the doctor that it is a plus that we caught this fairly early. Shannon is home and feeling better now. She's not a hundred percent but she is interested in the world and willing to play, so I'm hoping for the best.
Name: DebbieJRT Home: Bellerose, New York, United States About Me: crotchety cross stitcher, trying to channel my inner athlete See my complete profile
