September 24, 2011 I found myself sitting in an emergency vet exam room with my 4 legged baby.
I had been up all night with him as he paced & panted all night in obvious distress. Lack of sleep and an overload of worry had me very emotional. I had to keep my cool because my daughter had come with us.
The vet came in and did his typical thing. Pushed the belly, asked questions, looked in his mouth, asked more questions, checked his legs, more questions, stepped back and looked at the both of us.
"We'll get you an estimate for some tests that we will need to run, then you can decide what, if any, you want to proceed with".
I sent my daughter out to get my mom (thank God for mommy's discover card).
The nice man at the desk came back in with a detailed list of all x rays, labs, and meds they would like to perform. The price wasn't as extravagant as expected so I chose to proceed.
They left with my buddy and promised to be back in as soon as they got some results back. We sat in the room & chit-chatted about plans for the rest of the day. Not 45 minutes later the vet came back in. They look on his face had my stomach immediately in a knot.
According to the blood work, it appears as though my 4 legged son is bleeding somewhere. Not a problem, just a bleeding ulcer, or something that he had ate that maybe perforated something. Both very treatable.
We needed to look at the x ray. Okay, so obviously he had eaten something he knew good & well he wasn't supposed to.
We stood there in the dark room in front of a giant TV screen with what appeared to be my dog's stomach plastered on it.
He shows me ribs, heart, stomach, colon, and the tumor.
Tumor? I'm sorry did you just say tumor?
He continues to discuss the tumor while my eyes water & my chest starts convulsing. I can only catch a few words in my state of shock. Spleen, cancer, bleeding.
He walks us back into the exam room. I've started shaking at some point and clutching my daughters hand like my life depended on it. I glanced over at her, yep, she's crying too. I look at my mom, no tears. Okay maybe I thought I heard cancer, maybe that's not what he actually said.
I sat in the chair and stared up at him, trying my very best to clear my head and hear everything that was coming out of his mouth.
They need to get a chest x ray to see if it has metastasized. Okay, so do it. I don't understand what you're waiting for.
The vet walked out of the room & I looked up at my mom. The look on her face told me everything I thought I had heard was true. I brought my dog in for what I assumed was something he had eaten or a bad flare up of arthritis & was just told that he had cancer.
A few more minutes of me pacing around the room and the vet comes back in.
There's quite a few spots on his lungs which may be old clots, and spot that appears to be "moth-eaten".
Suddenly there we are, crammed back in this dark room, looking at an x ray. Now there are 2 more people in the room, and my precious dog lying on the table.
I don't know how it happened, but at some point I'm holding my daughter back while she's screaming for our dog. Tears are flowing freely at this point.
In a matter of an hour and a half I've been told that my dog, my furry baby, has hemagiosarcoma and it's inoperable. There's nothing they can do. There's a surgery but the chances of him surviving are slim to none. The obvious humane option is euthanasia.
Euthanasia? He was fine yesterday when I left to go to work & now I'm supposed to be okay with you telling me that he has to leave this world? I can't accept that. My mom, being the clear headed person that she is, asks the vet nicely if we can have a moment.
I paced the floor, asking her to tell me what to do. For the first time in my life I want her to tell me exactly what to and she won't.
"I can't tell you what to do"
After what seemed like an eternity of me pacing in circles, crying, and lying on the cold floor next to him, I look up at my mom.. "I want to take him home". What the vet didn't realize was the next day was my birthday, I wanted to spend it with him & my daughter.
They were very reluctant to let me leave with him. I took the chance of him dying on the way home, and the possibility that he wasn't going to make it through the weekend.
That night I found myself grilling hamburgers just so he would eat. My daughter didn't quite understand what was said, that I'm grateful. So we prayed and wished upon stars, and prayed some more.
He made it through the weekend. There were some close calls, and lots of tears. I couldn't bring myself to sleep, or even shower for fear that he wouldn't live through it.
Monday morning came with lots of fear. I had to take my daughter to school and leave him at home. I prayed he wouldn't see that as his opportunity to go. I got home and he was laying in the floor in the very spot that I left him. His tail wagged when I came through the door. *whew*
I made an appointment with our regular vet in the hopes that she would have some last ditch heroic effort, or that it was a misdiagnosis. At appointment time, she came in and wouldn't meet my eyes. I knew then.
I had 2 choices, take him home with some medicine to make him comfortable, or let him go. There I stood, shaking, tears falling, searching the faces of the vet & vet techs for any sign of advice. What do I do? He doesn't seem to be that sick. At that very moment he looked up at me with his big brown eyes & perked his ears up.
"I want to take him home, I can't do it. He was fine Friday morning, this is all too fast. I'm not ready"
So I brought him home on a death sentence with the instructions to let him eat whatever he'll eat. I can handle that.
Today is September 30th. He's made it longer than either vet thought. He's still with me & luckily today has been a good day for him. He's eating well & seems to be in a very good mood. I can't ask for more.
A week ago my world was turned upside down. My daughter is 9 and my dog is 8. He's been with me through thick and thin. He never judges me, and always listens very intently when I talk. He lets me cry, yell, or just sit and stare. He's the best friend I've ever had. I don't know what my life would be like without him. I'm stuck between a rock and a hard place. I brought him home knowing that today could be his last day. I don't want him to suffer, but I'm not ready to let him go.
What I've learned through all this is, hemaniosarcoma is a silent killer. Typically from diagnosis there's 6-8 weeks. By the time it's found it's too late in most cases. I wish there was some test out there for this disease. There are people working furiously trying to find one, but there's been no luck yet.
My hope in this is to not only let Waggoner's legacy live on, but to let others who have dogs become aware of this cancer before it's too late.
