Life Can Turn on a Dime

The Flame that burns twice as bright,
Burns half as long

Jimmy 05/10/2007-04/17/19

MACH PACH2 Fine Creek's Sharp Dressed Man
 RN HT MXB MJB MXP6 MXPS MJP7 MJPS PAX2 OF T2B

It is with a crushed heart that I tell of the loss of our Jimmy
on Wednesday morning. Only 12 days earlier he received a diagnosis of Hemangiosarcoma.

One of Jimmy's many nick names was "The Boss". He stayed in charge right to the very end,
passing away shortly before the vet came to ease his passage.

Jimmy was so much larger than life, a boisterous, funny boy who always had a lot to say
and he said it loudly! His personality ran to the intense and this made him an excellent
agility teammate for many great years. He loved that game and he gave it his all.

He was an avid television watcher and could pick out an animal character even if it was only a cartoon. He would quickly lose interest when nothing but people filled the screen.

He was the most intelligent dog I have ever had, understanding a huge vocabulary of words. But he was an even better communicator with his eyes. Whole conversations could be had watching the
expressions in his beautiful, bright eyes.

I will forever miss gazing into those windows of Jimmy's mind and soul.

To Anne his breeder, thank you for giving us one of the best highlights in ours lives.
Jimmy was one of a kind. I know you are grieving for him as well.

To Jimmy himself I say : As you journey across the Bridge, please know that you made our lives
so much better and that you are and always will be incredibly loved and incredibly missed.
That will never end. Keep an eye out for your brother Wilson, he won't be far behind.

Give Cancer the Paw: All I Wanted Was for Dylan to Die of Old Age

I am joining Jackie's blog hop on Giving Cancer the Paw . My story is a tribute to my first Cardigan Welsh Corgi, Dylan.

I am not going to re-hash what I wrote in that earlier post. I didn't even mention his cancer in that post. And there is a good reason. He beat it!

Here's his story:

At age 14, Dylan was still a pretty spry old man. He was still going for nice long walks, he was perky and happy. One day, we noticed a raw spot on his lower lip. It sort of looked like his upper canine tooth was rubbing that spot into a sore. We kept an eye on it for a while but it wasn't getting better, and, in fact, it looked worse. Despite being the lead in to the busy holiday period, we knew we'd better get him to the vet and have it looked at. They agreed with us it looked odd, but wanted to take a conservative approach, so we treated it with antibiotics and a topical ointment. Ten days later there was no improvement whatsoever so we opted for a biopsy to be done. This is no small decision with a 14 year old dog, but he was in apparent good health, so he had the pre-op blood tests, and then had a small surgery to remove some tissue. The sample was sent off to the lab and we waited. Just five days before Christmas, we got the news. Dylan had cancer, a rare and fortunately slow moving lymphoma. Luckily, the prednisone (a steroid) he had been taking in small doses for his IVDD had probably been helping to retard the cancer. The vet explained our options....do nothing and let cancer take its course (Dylan was, after all, an old dog already), or up his prednisone dosage to try to further slow the cancer and maybe buy some more time, or third, they could refer us to a veterinary oncologist. John and I both felt it was worth at least meeting with the oncologist to hear what they thought.

We met with the vet sometime after Christmas, and she explained to us the protocol she would use to treat Dylan if we so chose to go forward with it. She never tried to talk us into or out of treating him. She listened to our concerns, such as not wanting to put Dylan through chemo hell when obviously he was an old guy with a limited future in the best of circumstances. She explained that often dogs did not suffer the same discomforts that we humans did while going through treatment. He would not lose his fur, nausea would be minimal, and being a dog he could happily live in the moment and not brood on the diagnosis. And of course there were no guarantees. With no treatment he would probably live 6 to 9 months more, with treatment it could possibly buy him a couple of years. Truly, when your dog is 14, what more can you ask for? All I knew was that I wasn't ready for him to leave my life. Damn it!  I wanted my dog to die of old age, not from some nasty disease!

So, we opted to treat him. Luckily for Dylan (and us), his chemo came in pill form. At first he took his pill every week. He would sort of lay low for a day, not much energy, not very hungry. But that was it. The next day he would seem like himself. Little by little the dosage was spread out, once every two weeks, then once a month. He also took other drugs to help his organs withstand the assault that chemo is. By the end of a couple of months, the sore on his lip started to shrink! By the time his 15th birthday rolled around in July, he was determined to be in remission! The sore was GONE! There was no telling how long it would stay away, but at 15 he was cancer free! He was no longer in danger of dying of cancer, he was in danger of dying from being so freaking old!

And that's exactly what happened. Dylan lived almost another two years after finishing his treatment. He missed turning 17 by a mere two weeks! We helped him across the bridge when it was obvious he was ready to go. In the very end, it was his kidneys that gave out. Cancer did not take his life. We had won, even in the heartbreak of losing our old man.

Lots of people thought we were nuts for treating his cancer. Why spend so much money on an old dog? And I can see where that thinking comes from. But for me the answer was simple: LOVE! We both loved that dog like crazy. He had been our faithful friend for so long, he deserved to get all of the years of life due him. Luckily, we had the financial resources to go forward with the treatment. It was expensive. There is no denying that. This was way back around 2000 or 2001, so I can only imagine what the cost would be now. I hope I never have to find out! Jimmy and Wilson are strictly forbidden from getting this awful disease!

A sassy boy right to the very end!