www.Straydog.org UPDATE posted FRIDAY 12/12/03 at ~9:21 p.m. CT

Bill Arnold's Daily Straydog Log

FRIDAY DECEMBER 12 2003

Erin 's Report ...

Buffy is with Mom this evening

     Today Juana and I went to Morton Small Animal Clinic to visit with Buffy before the scheduled operation to find out what the blockage was in Buffy's intestine and hopefully repair it.

     Buffy was happy to see us. We petted and talked to him and went out to the van to bring in a ball for him to play with. Buffy was interested in the ball a little bit, but he didn't really want to play.

Juany comforts Buffy during a visit with the fella before his surgery.

Buffy touches the ball with his paw, but doesn't want to play.
Note his arched back, which shows he's in pain.

     Buffy's back was arched liked Fuzzy's was when Fuzzy wouldn't eat. Dogs do this because of pain, I remember Dr. Aiken saying about Fuzzy.

     We were hoping that Dr. Morton would find a tennis ball or something like this blocking Buffy's intestine. The doctor set up some chairs for us to be able to view the operation through large glass windows. Dr. Morton searched and felt through Buffy's insides. We saw him spend a lot of time on one organ, and I asked a technician who came out of the operating room which organ that was. It was the stomach, she said. A minute later this technician went back in with more tools and helped Dr. Morton as he took some pieces of a mass from Buffy's stomach for possible further diagnosis.

Buffy, Dr. Morton and an assistant in surgery

     Dr. M. had a very sad countenance as he was sewing Buffy up and completing the operation. We knew this wasn't good. When he was all finished, Dr. Morton came out and told us that the prognosis was grim. Buffy had a big mass in his stomach which also had grown into his intestines. It looked like a very aggressive form of cancer, and Dr. M. didn't feel comfortable operating on it, trying to remove every last cell and then reattaching the intestine and everything else the procedure would have entailed.

     He didn't know the prognosis of chemo with this apparent type of cancer.

     Already Buffy was in pain and couldn't eat. It looked like cancer to Dr. M., because of the invasiveness, and we know that treating cancers in dogs isn't real successful, especially with the mass being so big and growing so much already.

     With this information we decided to let Buffy not wake up, back to a life of pain, but instead we decided to let this poor, sweet, middle-age dog wake up into the after life, where I know he is running and playing ball with my mom right now.

 

Ojay came home form DVSC this evening

     While Erin and Juany were at our local vet's clinic to be with Buffy during his surgery, I drove to Dallas in the rain to pick up Ojay. Due to traffic and the weather I didn't arrive till four p.m., and there waiting for me was Gayle, the woman who was donating to Straydog the costs of Ojay's surgery to remove his calcified ear canal (and who also intends to pay for Ojay's second surgery on the other ear).

     I chatted with Gayle (who is a very sincere and dedicated animal lover) while we waited for them to call us in to talk with a vet about how we were to deal with Buffy between now and the second surgery which will be done in about four weeks.

     When we did go in to talk with a veterinarian, I was given two containers of antibiotics and a pill bottle of pain pills for Ojay.

     Ojay has to be confined in a small room (or kennel) in our hospital trailer, and he must wear an E-collar so that he doesn't try to scratch his healing ear.