Friday, March 5, 2010
One year ago today, Sol had surgery to remove the gingival pappillary (verrucous) squamous cell carcinoma in her lower right jaw. The decision to have the surgery was one we agonized over. The main reason for our indecision was that we didn't know very much about Sol. We had only had her for a few months and the only thing we knew was that she was on the older side. Exactly how old, we weren't sure. Her previous medical history was a mystery. Our only real concern was would undergoing such a serious surgery be beneficial to Sol's quality of life. Would Sol be able to adjust to having up to half of her jaw removed?
In the end we went with our gut feeling and I am so happy we made the decision we did. The time it took for Sol to adjust to her new jaw was minimal and I never could have imagined that she would recover as quickly as she did.
Granted, there have been lots of other bumps this past year, but I can say that Sol's oral cancer has not been one of those things. She is a trooper and I am very happy to be able to celebrate this milestone with her.
Monday, February 15, 2010
On Friday we took the whole gang to the eye vet for appointments. Luna was going in for a follow-up, Sol was going in for an overdue yearly checkup & Henry was going in for his checkup. Benjamin went along for the ride because he would have been a nervous wreck if he was the only one left at home. We sure can fill an exam room can't we?
First things first, Luna was very happy that she got the dog room this time around.
Luna got a good report. Her tear production was back up in her right eye. With her right eye doing better we are able to scale back on the number of drops, which makes me very happy. I'm sure it makes Luna happy too.
Sol was up next and she got a good report too. Her cataracts are looking about the same as last year which means no growth. Good news once again.
Henry had the last appointment and his technique was to keep his eyes closed for the exam.
Henry has the beginnings of cataracts so he goes in once a year just to get them checked out and to monitor their growth. Luckily, there has been no real change since the last visit.
Another round of great news!
Monday, February 8, 2010
On Friday, we took the girls, Luna, Sol & Cupid, to the vet for their annual exams. Each one of the girls is due for the annuals within one month of each other, so rather than making three trips to the vet I combine them all into one really big appointment.
I left the vet's office pretty much on cloud 9 because each little lady got a stellar report. The vet, the vet techs & all the staff at the vet's office were amazed at how well Sol was doing. She coughed when she first arrived, but she settled nicely in the waiting room. No one could believe that she had been out in the waiting room because they didn't hear her coughing.
While Sol was getting her exam, the vet said that it looks like we have Sol in a very good place. She looked happy & pretty healthy for her. I couldn't agree more. While this may be as good as it gets for her, I think we were both surprised that we ever got back to things being this good. I think we have a good baseline from which to judge and we will know better now when Sol isn't feeling so great.
Luna's exam went super as well. Of course here eyes aren't great, but we are doing the best we can with them. The next biggest concern for her was her dirty ears. I guess I will have to have a talk to Henry about that. We could just afford to flush her ears a bit more often. But, if that is our next biggest problem I consider us very lucky!
And Cupid got an excellent report. Next week, Cupid turns 12 and the vet said that she looks fantastic for her age. Her teeth look great and overall she is in excellent shape.
Everyone was also amused at how Cupid likes to travel to the vet. She absolutely hates cat carriers. Instead she prefers to go by leash & harness. So she has a freedom harness and a leash that we use to take her to the vet. And when she arrives at the vet she prefers to have her own chair in the waiting room. From there she peers out at her lowly subjects. Lots of other dogs excitedly rush over to greet her, but she is disinterested and unfazed. On this visit, a husky & a samoyed wanted to say hello. Their owners were amazed at how well Cupid does with dogs. I explained that she lives with four pugs. But they still thought she did well, because pugs are small dogs. I was going to explain that one of those pugs was Benny, but I thought it was best to leave it as it was.
While leaving the vet, I took a moment to soak in all the good news. It had been a while since I left there with good report. Sure, things aren't perfect, but they sure have been a lot worse than this.
Sunday, January 24, 2010
The normal Florida winter weather has returned and the boys have fallen right back into their usual routine. That makes for happy pugs.
Monday, January 4, 2010
Last week Luna went in for her eye checkup. It had been almost a year since her last visit and up until about two weeks ago her eyes were doing great. The last two weeks we noticed that her tear production in her right eye was pretty much nonexistent. When she went in for her checkup, the tear test confirmed what we already knew when it registered a zero for tear production in her right eye. On a good note, the tear production in her left eye was outstanding.
That is pretty much how the visit went. All good news for her left eye, all bad news for her right eye. The one good thing, although this isn't really a good thing, is that she has so much scar tissue built up on her right eye, that it being dry does not cause her much discomfort.
Even though she is not in much discomfort, we switched up her drop schedule for her right eye to see if we can get her back to the point of producing tears. We added two new medicines and completely changed up the schedule for her right eye. Her left eye drop schedule remains the same. Needless to say, I had to create a new spreadsheet to keep it all straight.
We go back in a month to see if the new drops are doing any good.
Luna took it all in stride. I think her biggest gripe is that she got stuck with the cat room again. As you can see, all the pictures in her exam room were of cats. She much prefers the dog room 
Thursday, December 31, 2009
First let me say how very grateful I am for all your support and well wishes. It really means a lot to me and helps me remain positive and keep on keepin' on during the difficult times.
I had a very nice conversation with Sol's specialist at AVS. The results of Sol's cytology and culture came back and showed no signs of cancer/tumor or infection. Meaning the excess mucus is a result of inflammation. Inflammation that can most likely be managed through the right combination of medicine. That was a huge relief! It was actually the first time we got good news from a test like that.
The specialist did caution me that it may take a bit before we discover the perfect combination of medicines and dosages that work best for Sol, but I assured her I was up for the challenge. We have lots of experience in figuring out the perfect treatment with Luna and her eye drops. (More on Luna's eyes is coming soon. She went for a checkup yesterday).
We also talked for a bit about Sol's quality of life and really what we could expect in the future. She explained that as long as Sol is not coughing non stop like before, the cough sounds a lot worse than it really is for Sol. Constant, prolonged coughing obviously takes it toll on her, but a little spell here and there is not terribly uncomfortable for her. Which is good because the cough sounds horrible.
The main warning signs that things are taking a turn for the worse are fainting and bluish coloring of her mucus membranes (tongue, gums, etc). This to me is the scary part. I can't even imagine what I would do if Sol fainted. Fainting and the blue coloring are signs that she is not getting enough oxygen and the airways are completely closing. And then the specialist casually tells me that Sol did better than they expected coming out of her anthseia from her scope because most dogs with a collapse like hers have quite a bit of bluish coloring when they come out of sedation, but she had none. That little tidbit of information simultaneously made me feel better and worse at the same time.
I specifically asked her about life expectancy because at this point I want to sorta have an idea. I have been living the last two weeks as if it is day to day and that is really taking a toll. The specialist confidently said that with the right combination of medicine Sol has a good 6 months to a year. Obviously this is not a guarantee nor is it a cap, but it is a guide. And frankly, even though it isn't a long time, it was longer than I had thought.
So, the main things we will need to be on the lookout for is an increase in the coughing, fainting and bluish coloring. The fainting and bluish coloring scares me. I hope we never get to that point, but I guess it is good to know what to expect.
So for now, I'm going to try not to think about fainting and I am going to focus on what is important. Things like car rides, walks in the pouch and spaghetti.
Wednesday, December 30, 2009
When we picked Sol up from her scope appointment at AVS we got to see pictures of her airway taken with the scope. I thought I would share the pictures with everyone as I think they give a pretty good idea of what the specialists can see with the scope.
Below is a grouping of three separate pictures taken by the scope. The two pictures on the top are of the area of Sol's airway where it branches off to her lungs. The third picture is from the middle of the trachea. You can see a slight collapse in the third picture, but the first two show just how bad the collapse is by her lungs. The airways around the branch should be circular. I have highlighted the collapsed areas as best as I could in the annotated picture below. Obviously the circles are not drawn to scale, but you get the idea. The airways should have a circular shape rather than an oblong shape.
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