April 3, 2012

Thank you for all your thoughts and prayers.  It is a comfort to know you are out there.  While no one actually said it, I need to stop thinking so much.  Trust my gut and don’t live in a ‘what if’ world.  It’s funny, because I do not play the ‘what if’ game in any other part of my life.  So the ‘what ifs’ are now out of my system.  Arri is not in any imminent, life threatening condition. At least, we don’t believe he is.   If we stopped all treatment, he would still have months – paws crossed - years left in him.  Stopping the treatment would mean a slow disabling of his leg, maybe not so slow.  The cancer is growing very fast, extremely fast actually, but is localized in the leg.  It is not known to spread to organs or lymph system.   However, if left untreated, the tumor would grow excessively large and could break up over time and spread.   

Of course, surgery generally slows growth for a year or more and when combined with radiation, it should be in complete remission.  Since none of that has been effective, I guess I should not put much hope in the statistics.  He is not in pain and he has no issues with walking, running or jumping.  He eats just fine, with the exception of an addiction to cheese.  Thus the dilemma: to treat or not to treat.  If he acted like an old dog, I would give him a break and enjoy the time.  But he thinks he is only 5 so, I have to fight for this old dog that is so young at heart.  On Friday we will talk to the Doctor.  I may change my mind once we talk but for now, we fight.  And if it does more harm than good, I will work less and we spend some time at the beach this summer.  Maybe we should do that anyway.  I know you love the water sweet boy.

I hope nobody minds if I double the price of my cakes to pay for all of this.  Just kidding…kind of…..