Yesterday we took Bovver Boy to his regular vet, Dr. Gardner, to get some X-rays of his chest. Good news! The X-rays showed his beautifully clear lungs! No signs of pneumonia at all, but they did have some concerns about his esophagus. They could see some signs of enlargement of his esophagus on the X-rays, which means we are now dealing with Megaesophagus. So, in the same way that the muscles in his legs aren't properly working, now the muscles in his esophagus are weakening as well. From now on, after Bovver eats or drinks we have to keep him in an upright position for a minimum of 5 minutes, but ideally 20 minutes.

He doesn't mind doing it when he gets to snuggle on the couch :)

Dr. Gardner has been so sweet to our boy and has given us some really great advice throughout all of this. Yesterday we learned that one of her dogs was also diagnosed with T-Cell Lymphoma and she chose to do the same treatment plan with Lomustine that we are doing. We picked her brain for a while and learned that her dog has been in remission for a year and a half! This is definitely not common, but it gives us hope and makes us feel that we made the right decision with the Lomustine treatment. She also recommended some new food, it's called Hill's Digestive Care and Bovver LOVES it! We're happy that he is finally eating something with more nutritional value. Anyways, Bovver's attitude and mobility has been great yesterday and this morning! We rarely had to carry him yesterday and he was able to potty completely on his own this morning. Such a resilient little boy, we are so proud of him! It has been getting cold here at night/early morning so this is how Bovver was sleeping as I left the house at 6:30.

Yes, he is under three blankets.

I am writing this post with a huge sigh of relief. Not only is our boy starting to show some more normal behavior, but Eric and I have received so much support from so many people lately. Thank you guys so much! Eric's mom came over with a donation to Bovv's treatment and some hamburgers and carrots for him. Thank you! We have also been trying to sell Eric's car to pay for some of his treatment and yesterday we sold it to none other than my brother! We're happy the car is going to a good home and we're extremely happy to have money in the bank for more treatments and emergency expenses (like $250 X-rays). After we signed the title over I got a call from my mom and sister. They said they knew we were going through a lot and they wanted to do something nice to cheer us up, so they are hiring a photographer to come take photos of us and our boys!! I cannot wait to show everyone! On top of all of this we have still been getting donations through our YouCaring and so many messages of love and support from everyone. Thank you, thank you, thank you!!!

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I don't think I can put into words how incredibly difficult this has been for our little family. Sampson has pretty much lost his play mate and is increasingly rambunctious since he hasn't had much attention or exercise. He was used to playing tug-of-war in the yard and running around like crazy with Bovver every day. I haven't taken him on any walks for fear of getting Bovver too excited when we leave and too anxious while we're gone. Bovver has always been a pretty jealous boy and he doesn't like when he is not included. Although Sam may not be playing much, he has been eating a lot! Bovver has rejected pretty much everything we have cooked for him so Sam reaps the benefits. Bovver won't eat boiled chicken, ground chicken, ground turkey, ground pork, dry food, wet food, dry food soaked in water and heated up, etc. We have settled him on a diet of beef burgers cooked on the grill and baby carrots, because that is all he wants to eat (and the occasional Three Dog Bakery treat from his grandma!).

Bovver's chemo really took a lot out of him. He was so tired on Friday and Saturday and was sleeping a lot. It also seemed to make his Myasthenia Gravis worse. He was having a really hard time getting around this weekend and we had to carry him almost everywhere. To the kitchen in the morning for pills and breakfast, then outside, then to his bed, then outside again, then to his chair, etc. On Saturday morning we woke up to him vomiting at the foot of the bed. Eric cleaned up and we tried to go back to sleep for a bit, but then Sampson got up and puked on the floor. No idea why Sampson was sick, he seemed fine immediately after and was fine for the rest of the day. Sympathy sickness?

On Saturday Bovver developed a pretty bad cough. It seemed to get worse as the day went on. He also started to have some strange muscle spasm like side effect where his neck and shoulders would hunch up, almost as if he was pulling his head into his body. We called his vet and prayed we didn't have to take him into the emergency room. They said it sounded like some kind of upper respiratory infection and to take him in on Monday unless things got worse. He looked so, so sad. He kept looking up at Eric like he was trying to give him some kind of message. We laid with him and pet him and cried. We started to think he was nearing the end. We thought maybe we made the wrong choice doing chemo. I fell asleep on his dog bed with him until Eric woke us up and moved us to bed. 

On Sunday I woke up early and gave Bovver his medication in bed. I came back to the kitchen to start getting the boy's breakfast ready and Bovver came prancing out of the bedroom. He ate all his breakfast (two hamburgers) and then started to PLAY with SAMPSON! Sampson ran up to me with his toy as I was sitting on the floor with Bovver and Bovv just grabbed it from him and started to play tug-of-war. I had the biggest smile on my face!!! I couldn't believe he went from where he was the night before to that. Totally amazed. Totally in awe of his perseverance. I can't tell you how reassuring that was. 

Anyways, I called the doctor this morning and explained his cough over the weekend and the other strange symptoms and she said to bring him in today for X-rays of his chest as they believe he may have aspiration pneumonia. Bring it on roller coaster. 

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I woke up this morning and half of Sampson's face was covered in hives. A 6:00AM trip to Walgreens and 3 Benadryls later and he was just fine. No idea what he get in to. If it's this crazy having dogs, how can anyone deal with having human children?

Well, we weighed our options up and down and came up with a decision. It certainly wasn't easy. Of course we wanted to do everything we could possibly do to keep our boy happy and healthy, but we wanted to make sure that it would be the best decision for Bovver and not just a selfish decision on our part. We decided to go with the Lomustine treatment. This way Bovver wouldn't have to be left alone at the VCA for two hours on a IV drip of one of the nastiest chemo drugs out there. He doesn't like going to the vet and especially doesn't like being away from us for long. The Lomustine treatment is taken orally once every three weeks rather than every week, so we thought this would be much easier on him.

We still have the option of changing our minds at any time, or if and when the Lomustine becomes ineffective. We are really hoping we can see Bovver boy turn 9 on February 1st, but we are very excited to have another Christmas with our baby. Especially because this is our first Christmas together in our beautiful new home. 

We took Bovver in for his appointment yesterday for his first treatment and things went great! His CBC was good and his white blood cell count was in the normal range, so they went ahead and administered a shot of L-Asparaginase and an oral dose of Lomustine. He came home and snuggled for the rest of the evening. He was very tired and not very hungry that night.

He would only eat out of dad's hand

This morning he had a hard time getting out of bed and when I carried him to the backyard to potty he wasn't able to hold himself up and peed all over himself. Interesting fact, his urine and feces are toxic for the 72 hours after his treatment, so I quick cleaned him up, carried him to bed and then thoroughly washed my hands and arms. He wasn't interested in his food, but took his medicine and probiotics like a champ. Right now he is taking 3/4 tab of Mestinon, 2.5 tabs of Prednisone, and a probiotic chew three times a day. We will be adding in some Omega-3 oil and Milk Thistle as soon as it arrives. 

Also, on a lighter note, we surpassed our donation goal on our YouCaring page last night! Thank you all so so so so much. You have no idea how humbled we are by this whole experience. We have such a great support system around us and we love you all.

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Yesterday, September 21st, we took Bovver boy to meet his oncologist Dr. Schrempp. Bovver had a pretty steady and rapid decline since the news last Friday that he had T-Cell Lymphoma. It seemed that his medication for Myasthenia Gravis wasn't working very well anymore. His appetite disappeared, he had horrible diarrhea and vomiting spells, he was often salivating profusely and he was again unable to walk. Just as fast as he got better he got worse.

When we parked the car in the parking lot Bovver was anxious to get out. Eric opened the side door thinking he would have enough time to pick Bovver up and carry him inside, but Bovver decided to jump right out of the car on his own. He collapsed pretty immediately and scraped up his chin and elbows, but was alright. We got him inside and he started to have uncontrollable diarrhea. It was literally falling out of him as we scooped him up and took him into a room. On top of that he was salivating everywhere and that was mixing with the blood from his chin scrape. So we left the waiting room with a trail of blood, slobber and shit and made our way in to meet Dr. Schrempp for the first time.

She went over all of the options available to us and went over the pros and cons for each:

1. Bone Marrow Transplant

• Possible cure, only 13 transplants in the US so far
• Hard to find a donor, so they use the dog's own bone marrow which increases the chance of the cancer coming back
• $20,000 plus travel to Los Angeles

2. CHOP Chemotherapy

• 70% of patients obtain remission
• Intravenous treatment every week (some treatments take 2 hours)
• Higher rates of side effects including painful side effects from the drug Vincristine
• 6 months remission
• $6,500

3. Doxorubicin Only

• 80% of patients obtain remission
• Intravenous drip treatment (2 hours) every 3 weeks
• 2/3 remission time of CHOP
• $3,500

4. Lomustine Only

• 70% of patients obtain remission
• Oral treatment once every 3 weeks
• 1/2 remission time of CHOP (for B-Cell Lymphoma)
• Reacts particularly well to T-Cell Lymphoma 
• $2,000

5. Prednisone

• No Remission
• Dog creates resistance to medicine in 6-8 weeks
• $20-80

We are taking the night to weigh our options and think about what we want for our boy, what HE wants, and what, ultimately, we can afford. 

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Bovver has had a pretty great week. It was as if he wasn't sick at all sometimes. He still struggles to walk on occasion and would often get tired, but other times he would gallop outside or even play around with his brother Sampson. His side effects from his medication have been pretty mild. He doesn't have the best appetite, but we are letting him try new foods and figuring it out.

Sunbathing

Kisses from Aunt Kristen

The only way he will eat sometimes!

On Friday, September 16th, after spending a few blissful days with our boy who seemed almost back to his old self, we got the call that confirmed he had T-Cell Lymphoma. This just happens to be the worst type of Lymphoma and with treatment may only give us around four months more with our baby. We were obviously heart broken, but we were ready to do whatever we could to make his ending the best one possible.

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Bovver got to come home with us on Thursday, September 8th. The next day was probably one of the hardest days for us. We got a call from the vet that Bovver's lymph node sample came back with a diagnosis of Lymphoma. Whoa. We were completely shocked and devastated. The vet still had some questions on the sample, so they decided to run another test to verify without a doubt the type and severity of his Lymphoma. 

That same day Eric's grandma's dog, Sam, had to be put to sleep. He was a great dog and we always gave him extra love and attention whenever we saw him. He was an older boy and was losing his battle to a few illnesses. Rest In Peace, Sam. We love you.

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This story starts on August 24th. Eric took Bovver Boy into the vet because he noticed his lymph node was enlarged. The vet said as long as he wasn't showing any side effects it really could be anything from allergies to an infection, so to just wait it out and re-evaluate in two weeks. 

Less than two weeks later, on Sunday, September 4th, we noticed Bovver Boy limping on what seemed to be his front right leg. We took a close look at him and thought he must have just had a minor injury from playing all day in the yard with his brother Sampson. They like to play pretty rough and this was not an uncommon occurrence. Our good friend, Mary, was staying with us that weekend recovering from knee surgery and our sweet boy Bovver decided to keep her company in bed that night. When we woke up the next morning Bovver couldn't make the jump off of the bed. Mary had to help him down off of the bed and that's when we noticed he was losing mobility of his hind legs. He was only able to walk 4 or 5 feet without sitting down or collapsing to the ground. He continued to get worse over the course of the day. Mary thought he might be suffering from arthritis, so we gave him some Vetprofen that we had left over from April of this year when we had a Mast Cell Tumor and an abscessed tooth removed. It didn't do anything to improve his mobility and he never really seemed to be in any pain to begin with. Things continued to get worse. By that evening he was almost completely paralyzed. Since it was Labor Day, we were unable to take him to see his vet so we called first thing Tuesday morning and the vet told us to bring him in right away.

When we took him into the vet he was unable to move his legs at all. This made for some very interesting potty breaks and a lot of carrying around our 60 lb baby (still does). They ran lots of tests on our boy. They took blood samples, a sample from his enlarged lymph node, X rays of his chest, back and hips, and checked all of his reflexes. They told us they thought he was suffering from a neurological condition and referred us to the Animal Neurology and Imaging Center in Algadones, NM (the only animal neurologist in New Mexico). 

We drove straight there with our boy in tow. They went over all of the tests that his vet ran and did some more of their own. They wanted to try to find out (or rule out) what could be going on. We decided to go ahead with the Tensilon test for Myasthenia Gravis, a disorder of signal transmission between the nerves and muscles. The test came back positive. We were so happy to finally know what was going on, but this meant that his immune system was lowered by something else, which caused the MG. Luckily, MG can be treated with medication. They decided to keep Bovver boy overnight to administer this new medication and monitor the side effects. The medication causes common side effects of "SLUD" Salivation, Lacrimation, Urination, Defecation, but an overdose can cause the heart rate to speed up to very high levels and cause really serious, irreversible damage. So, we kissed our baby goodbye, got his blanket from the car and promised to come visit him tomorrow. 

We visited him the next day to have some dinner with him and see how he was doing on his new medication. He was able to hold himself up, but was still unable to walk. He hadn't eaten since Sunday night, so the vet brought in a tray full of different foods for him to try. He still wouldn't eat unless Eric put the food in his mouth first! But, he ate and we cuddled him and loved him and promised we would be back for him tomorrow. The next day we got a call that we could pick him up! He was still struggling, but he could walk again! We were so happy to have our baby home and he was beyond happy to sleep in his own bed with his mama, daddy and brother again. 

If you'd like to see what Myasthenia Gravis looks like, check out Bovver's walk to freedom:

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