Roxy's New Life

Roxy is still going strong.  We used to take all the dogs for walks at the lake here in our little town, but we walk for 30-60 minutes each time and it’s all on a black top path.  So those walks are a little rough on Roxy.  We tried taking her a few times and each time we had to carry her off and on.  We don’t mind doing that really, but I don’t think she enjoyed it very much.  Plus, you look a little strange carrying a 45 pound dog around.  So we’ve decided that Roxy’s walks will either be short little walks on her on at the lake (and then take the big dogs later) or just running around our yard.  We have 2 acres so that’s not really a bad deal for her. 

She’s still on the homeopathic cancer protocol as I’ve mentioned a few times in the forums, plus she takes prednisone every other day.  She has severe allergies and we can’t keep her skin clear without it.  She ends up getting skin infections.  Plus the prednisone is used for MCT, so we get that extra security there too.  We’ve never done any follow up with Roxy as far as xrays or anything.  Her MCT was on her skin and frankly our vet is incredibly surprised she hasn’t had another break out (knock on wood).  We have no idea what’s going on inside her, but maybe it’s best we don’t know right now.  That way we’re not stressing over it and causing her stress.  At this point we’re just keepin on.  I think that’s best for my girl too. 

I hope you enjoy the pictures!  I was just posting pictures of Roxy (since this is her blog) but Kali and Dakota saw that and got jealous.  So I’ve added pics of all my rotten dogs.

Roxy pre amp

2 days post amp

Two days post amp

Roxy and my son, Izaak. Taken just today. 🙂

Dakota wearing dad's hat

Dakota just chillin on the porch

Kali on Left, Dakota on Right

Kali pouting after bath

Kali Girl

This is my brother's dog Maxx, and my Mom. Thought you German Shepherd lovers would enjoy this. And please don't tell my mom I posted a pic of her in her pajama pants on the internet...

Hi everyone!  It’s been forever since my last post.  But now that tax season is over with I can finally start living again.  🙂

Roxy seems to be doing very well!  (I say “seems” because you just never know and I don’t want to jinx us.  Goofy..I know.)  She is all healed up, her hair is starting to cover the incision.  She gets around wonderfully, often out running the quadrapawds in the family, and ALWAYS out running the bipeds.  As some of you may know, she seemed to be very depressed after the surgery, but that is long gone.  I found Dr. Loops on this website and had a consult with him.  We started Roxy on a homeopathic remedy and she came right out of the depression.  I see how she is progressing each week and I am amazed.  She’s playing with her boxer brother and sister again now that she’s more used to the new balancing act she has to play.  She’s just back to being our goofy, bouncy little boxer girl! 

It’s now been 1 month and 18 days since her surgery.  We’re very happy to still have her, but we still  kind of hold our breath dreading the worst and hoping it doesn’t happen.  You all know those feelings.  But as long as we have the ability we’re going to keep fighting for her and pray she has the strength to hold on. 

Leslie and Roxy

Hi everyone. Here’s my update on Roxy. It’s been 11 days since her surgery and I’m just starting to see her personality coming back into her eyes. I work constantly right now so I don’t get to see her often. I usually get home about 9pm so when I see her she says hello and crashes. I look in her eyes and see depression. She didn’t want to lay down beside us, she instead opts to lay in my bedroom by herself. Also, for several days it was a struggle to get her to eat anything. Sometimes when she tried to stand up she would just start screaming. I use the word screaming because it’s unlike anything I’ve ever heard from a dog. It’s literally a scream. Her vet says it sounds like nerve pain and prescribed a med for it. With all of this combined…well lets just say I now know what an ulcer really feels like.

Last night I came home and she had more energy than I had seen since the amputation. Still not completely Roxy, but a definite improvement. I took her for a visit with family and she wiggled her hind end (shes a boxer, so no tail). I was hopeful that it was the beginning of her climb out of the trenches. I went to work this morning (someone has to get those taxes done) and just pray all day that she is feeling good, relaxing with her brother and sister. I get home this afternoon and she is looking just as good, if not just a hair better than she did last night. 🙂 I walked around the back yard with her and my son and I took her for a car ride. She’s eating better, wanting to be beside us (she’s laying by me now), and just seems to be getting around better. Some of her Roxy shine is back in her eyes. I’m so afraid to feel positive because I hate being knocked down, but I can’t help but feel excited to see her acting like this today.

I have a consult with Dr. Loops on Monday. I hope he can really make my Roxy feel better and give me as much time with her as possible. Hopefully she’ll feel up to chasing the laser light soon! I have some seriously hilarious video of that.

Thank you all for being there, “listening” to me and giving me the advice, and allowing me to read your stories. Thanks especially to Catie & Mel, Mary & Cemil, and Tracy & Maggie for giving me some extra advice when I have bothered you! You’re all in my thoughts and prayers!

Leslie
Roxy, Kali and Dakota’s Mom

Yep, we’re on it. The infamous roller coaster. Roxy was doing so well for the two days she spent with the vet that we were hoping that would continue. But with being home comes more movement, more excitement and of course accidents involving other crazy dogs. Yesterday was a very bad day (from what I’m told. I was stuck at work all day). My husband said she cried a lot. Every time she was touched, when the other dogs bumped in to her. He said he and my son were almost in tears. I called the vet and got her a stronger pain killer, one with some anti-anxiety meds in it. She seems much better. She wants to follow me every where I go, so I’m trying to stay put as much as possible so she’ll rest.

I watched a video we took of her about a week before the amputation. She was so happy and energetic, just jumping all over the place. I don’t see how we’ll ever get back to that place. Is that a normal phase through all of this? I certainly hope so. I’ve read so many tripawd stories where the tripawd gets right back to being themselves again. I hope we are blessed enough to have the old Roxy back soon. I hope I made the right decision for her.

I tried to upload some pics tonight but I kept getting a “http error” pop up. Not sure what that’s about. Maybe because I’m not a supporter I don’t have enough memory space???

Pray for Roxy tonight. All you tripawds and tripawd parents are in my prayers.

Leslie

I know I just posted about concerns of a front leg amputee being able to use a dog door, but I have my answer already. My mom just called (she’s the one that took Roxy home for me) saying as soon as she let Roxy out of the car, she hopped up the steps, went in the house, straight to the back and through the dog door to go potty. LOL Evidently she didn’t have to think about it nearly as long and hard as I did. I was afraid it was going to be a tricky thing for her to get through that door. So if any of you have concerns about dog doors, don’t worry about it! They got it covered, they know what they’re doing. 🙂

I JUST LOVE DOGS!! THEY ARE SO AMAZING.

I just left Dr. Hollis’ office. My Roxy is on her way home, but I had to go back to work. However, when I saw her she was doing wonderfully! Wagging her tail and hopping around. They said she’s doing good at taking a couple stairs, so she won’t have any trouble with our porch. But the next thing is the doggy door. Any of you have a front leg amputee that uses a doggy door? I just can’t picture how that will work. I’m sure she’ll figure it out, but if any of you have seen this please let me know. Just to put my mind at ease…

Her incision looks so much better than I expected. I guess they used some kind of glue, so she only has 2 stitches!! The skin is loose and a little flabby, but she said that will tighten up. I was expecting tight skin and lots of stitches/staples. For now she’s wearing a t-shirt to try to cushion the shock on my son. He’s 9, but he has trouble with stuff like this. I’m hoping he’ll still treat her the same though.

Dr. Hollis called this morning. Roxy is up “hopping” around, eating and even wagging her tail at Dr. Hollis’ daughter! I wasn’t able to eat all day yesterday, I nibbled on breakfast this morning, but after the vet’s call I am starving! I’m so proud of our girl. Now I just wish I could see her, but that’s not going to happen until tomorrow afternoon. Hopefully things will keep looking up. Roxy deserves a break on something in her life.

Okay, she’s there.  I dropped Roxy off at the vet’s office at 9 this morning.  Dr. Hollis spent a lot more time with me to try to calm my crazy anxieties….again.  And then I had to leave.  My poor girl was shaking and looking at me like she just didn’t get it.  I feel horrible and I’ve had a huge stomach ache all day.  I don’t see that going away any time soon.  To leave her there to go through this is killing me because she doesn’t seem to have had much luck with people before she found our family.  She’s not a confident dog.  She’s made so much progress in opening up in the last few months and I worry that this is going cause her to take some steps backward.  But I pray she comes through this as the same crazy little girl she’s been lately.

Just wanted to say thank you to everyone for the kind words and encouragement. 

Roxy is a beautiful girl.  I’m going to try to post some pictures, but I’m not too good with this site yet.  I’m not even sure I’ll be able to.  Plus, I’m a CPA so I’m not home very much right now.  I think it’s her size that make her so beautiful though.  She only weighs 43 pounds!  Compare that to my other boxers who weigh 70 and 75, she’s not much.  She’s like a perma-puppy!  We thought she was a puppy when we first found her.  But she holds her own with the big dogs.

Thanks again.  I’ll let you all know how things go after tomorrow. 

Leslie

Hi!  I’ve been reading the blogs for about a month now, but haven’t posted anything of my own.  I have a few questions, but first for some background info on my baby girl.  Roxy is my boxer girl.  Well, one of my boxer girls actually….I have two girls and one boy.  We bought Kali almost three years ago as a puppy.  We loved her so much and we wanted her to have a friend.  So we adopted Dakota from a local shelter the following year.  That was 2008.  Then last summer I see this little boxer trotting across our back yard.  She had a collar so I went outside to see if there was a name tag.  When I got close to her I realized she was in really bad shape.  She was severaly malnourished, covered in bugs, and her paws were swollen to three times their normal size.  She was very timid.  She came to me, but stayed at arms length, just enough for me to touch her with my finger tips, and she would not make eye contact with me.  I lured her to my house with food and gave her a place to sleep.  And that’s exactly what she did every chance she got for the next three days.  The day after I found her my husband and I took her to the vet, got her shots and decided if we couldn’t find owners she was going to stay with us.  Needless to say, we never found owners. 

We got to work on getting her back in shape.  I actually started to count the number of ticks I picked off her, but stopped at 70.  My husband later told me that he had done the same thing, but stopped at 50.  Fast forward a couple months and the “spot” that was on her right, front elbow had blown up….it was about three inches in diameter.  Originally we thought it would heal on its own, then it just seemed that over night it was huge.  We took her to the vet and was told it was a pressure sore.  Antibiotics didn’t touch it.  I took her back and asked if it could be cancer.  The biopsy showed a Grade III Mast Cell Tumor. 

Immediately I switched vets.  Our original vet is an old country vet, and I just felt that he should’ve realized there was something wrong since it didn’t heal.  Of course I don’t blame him completely.  I beat myself up everyday with the “if only”s.  If I would’ve asked questions immediately maybe we would have caught it at grade II or even grade I and her prognosis might be better…you know how it is….

Our new vet is amazing.  She’s very patient and spends a whole lot of time answering my questions.  Of course the only option is to amputate.  However there are no guarantees that the cancer hasn’t already spread.  I can’t stand the thought of putting her through major surgery and her having to deal with the cancer anyway.  I put her through the first round of tests…blood work, buffy coat analysis and x-rays.  They all came back clear so I scheduled the amputation for the 15th of February.  But I just didn’t feel right about it.  I struggled so much that I opted for more tests, knowing that if they came back negative I still had no guarantee that the cancer hasn’t spread.  But if they came back positive then I would know not to put her through amputation.  So I had an abdominal ultrasound and biopsy of the liver and spleen done.  All came back clear.  So I have once again scheduled the amputation for next Tuesday, March 2nd. 

I’m obsessed with this whole thing, paranoid, worrying myself until I have developed an ulcer.  I check her everyday for some sign that it has spread still fearing putting her through surgery.  Then yesterday I found a lump on her hind leg.  I don’t know what it is of course, but in my mind the cancer has spread and this is it.  I still plan on taking her Tuesday, but I’m going to ask the vet to look at the spot and maybe do a needle aspirate to see if she sees anything suspicious.  If so, I’ll just bring her back home and enjoy the time we have with her.  If  not, the amputation is going to happen.

One of the things I will never forget, no matter the outcome, is the fact that it wasn’t until we started paying special attention to the spot on her leg that she started acting like she is truly our dog.  She seems more alive than she has the whole time we’ve had her.  She now plays harder than any of the other two, even though by the vets estimates she is the oldest.  She loves on us more and just seems happier.  Maybe she’s relieved she doesn’t have to go through it alone.  Maybe she’s relieved that we’re helping her.  I don’t know.  But its crazy how even dogs live better when their lives are at stake. 

The reason I’m doing this blog is I need advice and support.  My husband is a wonderful man, but a man none-the-less, so he has trouble with the support part of this.  I want to do everything I can for her, but I don’t want to be selfish.  I don’t want to put her through a bunch of bad things that won’t help her just so I can help my conscience or hopefully have her around a few extra months.  Like I said, I will do the amputation if there still isn’t any sign of metastasis.  But I want to do more.  I’ve read some things of holistic treatments but I can’t wrap my head around it.  I remember reading one comment where they mentioned Essiac Tea.  Have any of you had experience with this?  Can anyone give me advice? 

Thank you so much ahead of time!  And good luck to all of you going through similar or worse situations.  You are all in my prayers. 

Leslie

Roxy, Kali and Dakota’s Mom