Raggs went to the vet on Monday for his pawdicure and annual exam. His exam showed that the tumour has grown both inside and outside, but he is still hanging in there. My vet offered blood work if I really wanted to know how he was doing but she said she expected the results to be the same as they were last December with the astronomically high White Blood Cell count because she still believes he has a mass inside that will eventually kill him. She has no explanation as to why he's still doing fine, but said she believes he is living on borrowed time and will eventually succumb to the cancer. I decided there was no point in stressing him out with blood work because I doubted we would learn anything new from it, and nothing would be done if there was another abnormality.
My vet also said she believes he wouldn't live through the surgery and I agree with that. Keeping my fingers, toes and everything else crossed
he hasn't had a "bleed" in several weeks. My vet agreed with me that a bleed is exactly what is happening when his gums get pale afterwards and he is totally wiped out for a week or two until I get enough fresh chicken liver into him to bring his hemoglobin back up. After several weeks his gums are always pink and in the last week or two they have been quite pink with no paleness visible at all.
Anyway other than the increase in the size of the tumour and it now visibly looks like a tumour, not just smooth skin, the way it did initially, he seemed healthier than he did at his last appt. His heart was more audible to her this time, there was no murmur as before, and his heart rate was not rapid like it was the last time. His hind end is still weak, despite the metacam and UbaVet (glucosamine, chondroitin and MSM) and she believes it is just his age and his condition causing it.
Since he saw the vet on Monday, he is slowly regaining his strength. Tuesday he was totally wiped out, slept most of the day, wasn't interested in food until I spent some time waking him up, and was breathing very rapidly all day and night. Wednesday his breathing was still rapid at times, but he spent more time awake and less wiped out. He was able to go outside to relieve himself too using the stairs without falling. Yesterday, he was almost back to normal, breathing was back to normal and so was hind end strength.
But today, I fed him and it took me ages to wake him up. He was breathing very shallowly and I was worried that he wouldn't wake up. However, eventually he did and got up and moved around. He finally ate his food about an hour later, but still seems overtired. I was concerned, that things were worse, yet his gums were a normal pink colour and that made me think that he was just very deeply asleep and I guess that was the problem because when he finally woke up, he moved around the house. So hopefully he will continue to improve and regain his strength, it looks like he is
Thanks everyone for your continued support for us, both Raggs and I appreciate it.
