Well, I was all ready to write another Happy Doggy Post today since Snowy ate his new food great last night and was bouncing around the house like a frisky puppy.
This morning? Not so much. He took one tiny nibble of his breakfast portion and then stopped eating. He seemed fairly peppy for a while but he’s sleeping beside me now.
Sigh.
I guess I’ll give him three or four hours to see if he decides to start eating again and then make another Vet Call to see what we need to do.
I think it’s incredibly dear that so many people have been checking in on him over the past few days. It makes my heart happy to know that we aren’t the only people who love this sweet doggy. You can see by the stat counter that the past two days have seen a big increase in page views from the normal traffic pattern. I think we have a celebrity on our hands!
Of course, he’s not such a big celebrity that he’s too important to assist with jobs around the house—like helping his mom and sister wrap Christmas presents. He was right there in the middle of everything last night--he’s a “paws on” pup!
In the midst of all the wrapping, he took a few moments to have a heart-to-heart talk with his Sis and tell her all about his recent hospital stay. The two of them are Hospital Buds from way back.
They discussed IV’s and X-rays . . .
. . . and surgeries and doctors.
And finally, when Snowy had gotten all of his burdens off his (cute, white) chest he said, “Whew! I feel so much better now!”
These are a couple packages that he “helped” me wrap. What would I do without him?
In other Smith Male News, Steve was violently sick all through the night--vomiting, diarrhea, chills, sweats, etc. In fact, he came very close to passing out once.
So today I shall be his designated nurse/brow soother/bucket emptier and also Snowy’s designated nurse/pill giver/vet caller.
I'm writing this note with a very contented, happy, quiet doggy lying beside me on his red blanket in the big chair.
I got home shortly after Steve brought him home from the vet and I acted like a positive idiot squealing and carrying on over him.
He's on tons of meds and a few restrictions (and to his great horror he is sporting a PINK dressing on his IV site), but all in all, he seems to feel well. He wolfed down the first serving of his new food without a quibble, so that was a big relief.
Thanks to ALL of you for checking in here, for praying, and for sending warmest Snowy thoughts our way.
He ate a teeny little bit of food this morning and is keeping it down so far. The vet is still waiting on one of the pancreatic tests to come back, but she thinks that his most recent and urgent problems (vomiting, no eating, etc) are diet-related.
She’s going to keep him in the hospital most of the day and keep I.V. fluids going; if all goes well, we can pick him up mid afternoon. He’ll be sent home on an antibiotic, Prednisone, and a liver medicine; she said he’d have to stay on the liver med for the rest of his life.
She’s also putting him on an entirely different “medical diet” from the “medical diet” he’s been on for the past year.
But we can deal with lots of meds and new diets. He’s alive! He’s coming home!
May I just add that it’s pretty easy to tell who the popular member of the Smith family is. When I checked the page view counter at 10 am, it was already at the number that usually takes until early afternoon to reach. In other words, you guys are checkin’ in on him often.
(No word yet from the vet as to how Snowy did overnight.)
When I got up this morning and went around the house, all I could see were signs of Snowy.
His favorite chew toy with the squeaker inside.
His sweater.
His food and water dishes. . .
. . . and the unmistakable signs that he scratches his rug, hoping (I guess) to find a whole cache of hidden bones. And you know what I always tell him? Good luck with that.
The red blanket I put in the chair for him so that when he lies down beside me as I write, his little sweet belly isn’t too cold against the leather chair. (Yes, I know. He is spoiled. Rotten.)
The signs of one of his (very) few annoying traits. When we got new rugs for our recent bathroom re-do, he became convinced that there was a bucket full of chicken, steak and hot dogs hidden somewhere in the tufts of the rug and he started digging to find it. We can always tell when his (forbidden) digging has taken place because of the fluffs of tuft that waft out into the hallway.
But with a face this cute . . .
. . . he is quickly forgiven.
Yesterday when I made the appointment to take him to the vet, I told Steve he didn’t need to come with me because A) Steve had a jam packed schedule for the day and B) I was assuming they were going to say, “Hmmm. It looks like the food we gave him last week doesn’t agree with him. Let’s try something new. (Because that’s basically what they were suggesting when I called about bringing him in.)
So I thought, “No big deal. It’s a change-of-diet visit. I can do this alone.”
After Snowy and I had been taken to an exam room to wait, he got extra, extremely, super hyper. The vet does that to him. I would estimate that over a span of fifteen minutes, he got on my lap, jumped down, asked to get back up, jumped down, asked to get back up, etc. at least 50 times. It was very much like spending fifteen minutes with a hyper active toddler. He’s usually a fairly calm dog so I could tell how anxious he was. (I was also relieved to see him displaying that much energy!)
The vet came in, did a quick exam and then said, “With a dog this small and with the serious issues he has, this is ‘sacred time.’ This is time we can’t squander in finding out what’s going on.”
She added, “I know he just had an x-ray ten days ago, but I’m going to do another x-ray, as well as some blood work.”
She gathered Snowy in his arms and as I watched his fluffy white self disappear down the hall into a scary place without me, I got sort of stressed. And emotional. And even though I knew Snowy wasn’t sick enough that we were going to have to make The Decision that very day I still thought, “I wish I had asked Steve to come with me after all".”
About five minutes later, the door of the exam room opened and in walked Steve!
He had just happened to be at the pharmacy across the street dropping off a prescription and when he found out how long the wait was going to be he thought, “I’ll just go on over and see how things are going with Snowy.”
Fifteen minutes later, when the vet returned, I was extra grateful for his presence.
Why?
Because when she started talking, I started crying.
She started showing us copies of Snowy’s blood work and the levels that were supposed to be high were low, and the levels that were supposed to be low were high. When she mentioned that one of the kidney stones was bigger, that he had pancreatitis and there were a lot of other issues going on, I just cried all the more.
So basically, the three of us functioned very much like an impressively well-oiled team.
She talked. Steve listened. I cried.
I just couldn’t help myself. I would pull myself together for a minute or two and then she would move on to her next point and I’d be gone again--mascara, mucous, tears, everywhere.
She basically said he could die within a week, or that he could possibly even live another couple of years; until she saw how he did through the night, she wouldn’t be able to give us a real accurate prognosis. Bottom line though? She said he was a very sick dog with a lot of things wrong.
She told us that they don’t have ultrasound equipment here in town (to get a better look at his pancreas and kidneys) and he would have to be sent to a specialist quite a distance away for further testing. (At great expense.) She mentioned that the kidney that had the larger stone could be removed entirely. (At even greater expense.) And then when she said he’d have to spend the night in the hospital I remember thinking through my tears, “When is enough enough? Do we say we will spend $400 but not $900? Do we say we will spend $1200 but not $3000? How much is a doggie’s life worth? How much should we allow him to suffer? When is enough enough, on all fronts?”
I just don’t know.
I’m sitting here anxiously waiting for the phone to ring, to find out what’s next on this Snowy journey we’ve been on for eleven years. Is the journey over? Or do we still have a few more miles to travel with our little buddy?
I’ll write more tomorrow, but here’s a brief report on Sir Snowy.
Snowy has to stay in the hospital at least overnight. He has a high white cell count, pancreatitis, high liver enzymes, increased blood in the urine, and also, one of his kidney stones has grown bigger in the last ten days and is showing up brighter on the x-ray. (Meaning that it has become more “dense.”)
Since he has eaten and drunk very little in 36 hours, he’s very dehydrated and will be on IV fluids and antibiotics all night.
The doctor said we would be called immediately if there’s any change during the night; otherwise, we’ll hear from them in the morning as to whether or not he responded to the treatment and what’s next.
I keep looking around the house waiting for him to show up. But he doesn’t.
I heard back from the vet who said that since Snowy is eating very little and has been vomiting, she really needs to see him. He also doesn't seem to be urinating very often and that's the last thing we need right now.
I'm taking him in at 3:45.
Sigh. He's asleep again. Still snuggly in his red coat.
Stop! Before you go one step further, read one more word, or take one more breath (well, maybe that’s a bit extreme), listen to this 30-second song. I promise it’ll make you smile.
This is from our “Like A Blanket” CD and features Sarah when she was 7 years old and just a couple weeks away from a bone marrow transplant at Duke. To have a small, bald child stand in a studio and sing about heaven when she’s about to undergo a medical procedure that few kids survive—well, it’ll touch your heart.
(Note: at that particular point in her treatment she had a feeding tube, so when you hear a bit of a rattle in her voice, it has to do with that tube.)
Here is a compilation of short samples from the same CD. I’ll never forget recording the last song featured here (When Heaven’s Calling) and having to stop more than once to wipe my tears away—always, always thinking of Sarah while I sang, and wondering how much longer she would be with us.
To look back at that unsettling, heartbreaking period of life eight years later with a healthy fifteen-year old living in our house—well, it makes those tears all the more precious.
Here are a few brief excerpts from the CD. Ordering info is at the end of this post. (And yes, that is Steve in the picture!)
SARAH AND VICTORIA
When I posted yesterday about Sarah’s friend Victoria coming to visit, I forgot to post one of my very favorite pictures of the two of them. Is this dear, or what?
And speaking of “the girls,” “Anonymous” had this question about them:
Just wondering...How did Sarah and Victoria meet?
Whenever our family was not on the road traveling, we parked our RV at our home church in Mooresville, NC. One night, Steve and I were going out to a minister’s Christmas Dinner and needed someone to babysit Nathan and Sarah. We asked our pastor (and dear friend, Danny Stephenson) if he could recommend someone to us, since we weren’t usually at home long enough to get to know all the people in the church.
Well, he just happened to recommended a lady named Crystal Southerland, who showed up at the door of our RV with little Victoria in tow.
And the rest is (very happy) history!
SNOWY
Just a little note about Snowy, since so many of you have taken to heart our little buddy and his medical condition.
I mentioned yesterday that he had thrown up and didn’t seem interested in his canned food, which (last week) he was basically inhaling within about thirty seconds of having it put out.
This morning when we put out his breakfast portion of canned food, he took one teeny bite and then completely ignored the rest—as well as his dry food, which stays out all the time.
The bad part about all this (besides the fact that he’s stopped eating almost completely) is that it’s the canned food that is supposed to be our only remaining “magic bullet” to help slough away those kidney stones. If he won’t eat that—well, what then?
I’ve got a call into the vet to let her know what’s going on. In the meantime, he is cozily curled up beside me in his chair, wearing his little red sweater, and very deeply asleep.
This is one of those precious moments in life, quiet time spent with a doggie friend who may not be with us a great while longer. (And yes, I’m crying as I type that.) He’s such a good little guy and has brought us such joy and so much comfort in tough times.
Praying for a Christmas miracle but wanting to do whatever is best for our little buddy.
And on that subject, Leece left a comment: Prayers for Snowy. It's awful when you know 'the decision' is coming. Is it simply the cost that has made you come to the conclusion not to go ahead, or are their medical reasons too? Prayers for you all.
Leece, I think if this were a dislocated hip or a broken leg or something unusual and not likely to recur, we might consider trying to find the money for treatment. But since this is his second “stones episode” in a year and since the older he gets, the more prone he will be to producing stones, we’re just not willing to go through all this trauma and expense on a repeated basis.
His last surgery was very difficult for him and for us—he was in ICU for a couple days and downright miserable and demoralized when we were finally able to bring him home. I just don’t want to see him face all that again.
ORDERING INFO
I posted last week that we are making available “Chicken Soup for the Soul: The Cancer Book” (which contains Sarah’s story) as well as our CD, “Like A Blanket.”
We just got another shipment of books in today, so we’ve got plenty! Here is a brief description of the book from Amazon:
A support group you can hold in your hand, this loving and inspirational collection of intimate stories,by cancer patients and their loved ones, medical professionals, clergy and friends, is a must-read for anyone affected by cancer. Writers share all their experiences--from the diagnosis, to breaking the news to loved ones, to discussing the effect on home, school and work, from securing a medical team to living through an ever changing self-image, from the embarrassment of losing hair to discovering a new spirituality.
And here’s the picture from the cover of our CD. I think it’s been awhile since I told the story of this particular shot. The photographer (obviously able to discern that Sarah had a sense of humor) said, “Sarah, your hair’s messed up!” And then pushed the shutter immediately and captured her merry response.
The proceeds from the sale of this book and/or CD will go toward helping me purchase a DSLR camera.
The cost is just a donation for either or both items. Please also include $2 for CD and $5 for book, to cover postage.
Somehow leaving for a long trip to the doctor at 6:30 Friday morning didn’t seem quite so bad when I got to look at this on my way out of town.
When I arrived back home at about 4 pm, Sarah was camped out in the kitchen, looking out the front window and eagerly awaiting the arrival of our special house guests.
Finally! They arrived! Victoria and her mom, Crystal! Hurray! And other exclamation-marked words!
Crystal presented me with a wonderful basket of goodies when they arrived. I just love me a basket of goodies!
And speaking of Crystal, she and a couple of her friends have a wonderful Etsy shop called Tulle and Twine. Here’s an ornament that she made and gave to me.
Sarah and I would consider it a personal favor if you would drop by and look at their gorgeous, quirky, creative items. It’s not too late to order for Christmas!
But back to Friday--to make the day even more special, Friday was also the 11th anniversary of when Sarah and Victoria first met as four-year old tykes. Plus, Sarah had been anticipating for many months the opening day of “The Voyage of the Dawn Treader,” the latest movie in the C.S. Lewis series. And Friday was That Day!
She was so happy that her best bud got to be in town to go and see the movie with her.(Poor Steve was outnumbered 4-1 on our Big Movie Outing but he was very brave and courageously held his own as the only male on our grand adventure.)
It was a fun movie and a fun weekend, made all the more special by getting to celebrate how long these two girls have been friends.
That was then . . . this is now. Happy eleventh anniversary, girls!
And now on to . . .
Snowy News
First of all, I’d like to thank those of you who suggested in the comments section the possibility of helping to pay for a surgery for Snowy; our family (and Snowy, especially) is honored that you would care enough about our little buddy to express such sweet generosity.
However, we have come to the point where we’ve decided that if another expensive surgery turns out to be his only option, well—we’re not going to choose that option.
Tough stuff.
This morning, he definitely did not feel well—he was all trembly, he threw up once, and then refused to eat his canned food (which he usually loves) and some pain med I gave him soaked into bread, which he also usually loves and gobbles down immediately. Thankfully, this afternoon, he has started to eat just a little.
We’re watching him, and pampering him, and cuddling him. (And also shedding a few anxious tears.)
A little water; not much food.
Sigh. I guess mom is pointing that silver box at me again; I should try to look a little lively.
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