Sit. Stay. Read.
obsessed with dogs
That Dylan Thomas poem has been swirling around in my head for weeks now. The first stanza, anyway: Do not go gentle into that good night, Old age should burn and rave at close of day; Rage, rage against the dying of the light. Lucas has been having a ball. He is absolutely raging. Heck, …
That’s the only question these days, and it doesn’t have a straightforward answer. He’s great: He loves our micro-hikes and fast food trips. He loves friends dropping by with beef stew, cheese, bacon treats, and snuggles. Lots and lots of snuggles. He loves taking super slow strolls with lots of long pauses around the block. Then, …
At his checkup yesterday, Lucas was amazing. He has come so far since those early, fearful, aggressive days when the front desk staff would have to clear the lobby just for Lucas to even walk through the door. No, yesterday, he nailed it. Dogs on flexis, big dogs, little dogs, owners on their cell phones… …
I wrote this post while staring down at my belly button… please forgive its length and self-absorption. When John started his new job, one of the benefits was a spousal life insurance policy. So, of course, I filled out the paperwork. And got turned down. For life insurance. Why? Because, and I’m paraphrasing here, at …
We heard the elderly couple express their fears of administering an oral chemo at home to their dog, Dixie. Their concerns centered around one theme: What if something goes wrong? We heard them tell the oncology resident about Dixie, about how she literally saved their lives from a burglar and how she, as his farm-hand, …
Since December 6, 2011, the day I got my diagnosis, cancer has ruled my life. After that, it was four surgeries followed by a year of chemo followed by five years–currently in progress–of quarterly tests and checks and appointments and driving to and from Indy a million times for blood work. In the midst of …
Guess who’s finished with chemo! After last week’s debacle, we repeated his blood work locally, and he was good to go. So, back up to Purdue for his fourth and last round of chemo! And, once again, he did GREAT! Better than great, actually, because he didn’t flip out in the lobby despite it being …
Yesterday Lucas was due for his fourth and hopefully final dose of chemo. As you can probably guess, it didn’t happen. He had a blood test on Tuesday, and both his platelets and his white counts were too low to administer the chemo. I’m thrilled it saved us the drive to and from Purdue–and all …
Both Emmett and Lucas had their blood panels this morning at our local vet. Em’s is just routine; since he’s on oral chemo probably forever, they’re monitoring his levels every 10 weeks. Lucas’ is part of the weekly checkups he gets for his Purdue chemo trial. With both of them undergoing two different chemo protocols, …
After I wrote the post on osteosarcoma and amputation, I wanted to write one about chemo, too. But it was such a roller coaster those first few weeks. I thought I’d wait until things settled down. And then I realized: Duh. Chemo IS a roller coaster. It’s not going to settle down until it’s over, so …
“You chose to amputate the leg,” the oncology resident nodded. “It’s not an easy decision but, I think, the right one.” Frankly, for me, the decision wasn’t a difficult one: Without amputation, this insidious cancer, osteosarcoma, would take Lucas in only a few months, if not weeks. With amputation, his prognosis expanded to around four …
(To the tune of “The sun will come out tomorrow,” of course!) The stitches come out tomorrow! So, they gotta hang on til tomorrow, come what may! Tomorrow, tomorrow no sutures tomorrow! It’s only a day awayyyyyy! No? Ahem. OK, I hate to even type this sentence because there are still about 20 hours until these …
Yesterday morning, we emerged from the fog. Lucas came home from the hospital on Thursday. We knew it would be hard. We had no idea how hard. On Thursday, he did well. We arranged our living room so that he was corralled into one area with a mattress. We put throw rugs, door mats, and bath …
I’ve had this refrain, practically a mantra, that I’ve been repeating over and over. “When things get back to normal…” When things get back to normal, I’ll restart my running/training plan with Cooper. When things get back to normal, I’ll finally sweep the melted snow and sand and ice out of the garage. When things …
