We took Toop to the vet today to have more x-rays done. We wanted to have a chest x-ray done to see if we could see tumors in her chest, and the vet wanted another x-ray of her leg. Unfortunately the chest x-ray was inconclusive. The vet thought he might see tiny tumors in her lungs, but he just wasn't sure. He said you sometimes see things like that in older dogs that aren't tumors. I think we were kind of hoping the x-rays would come back telling us that the cancer has definitely metastasized because then we would know for sure that we shouldn't go through with amputation. Unfortunately they didn't. So we're still not sure what we are going to do. Her leg is definitely already worse. The vet was disappointed that the cancer had already progressed so much in just a week and a half. He agrees with us that his original estimate that she has maybe 2-3 months was generous, and thinks it's more likely to be 4-6 weeks now, if that. So now we have to decide what we are going to do. Do we amputate and hope we get another 12 months with Toop? Or do we say our good-byes knowing she had a great life, no dog could have asked for more, and not put her through that. It's really hard to know what to do. The Chinese herbs came in though so we started her on those this evening – maybe they will slow things down a little.
In other news, Stian had a great nap at the vet. We were there for about an hour and he napped laying on me as I sat on a sofa. He slept for about 45 minutes, which is more than he's been napping at home. I guess the trick is for me to hold him while he naps. Ha! I don't think so. I do think I might try sitting in his room with him while he's napping tomorrow though and reading or something. Then maybe I can catch it when he first starts to wake up and see if I can coax him back to sleep before the wakes up too much. I read this suggestion in the baby sleep book I read. I listen for him to wake up over the monitor and run in there, but it seems to be too late, because I sit there and shush him and sing to him and try to get him back to sleep and he just lays there either staring at me or smiling at me. But maybe if I can catch it a little earlier.
He also totally refused the bottle tonight. Kris tried and tried, but Stian wasn't having it. He wouldn't even take an ounce. Kris tried for almost an hour and then we gave up and I nursed him. We don't want him to associate being upset with the bottle, so I'm not sure how we will handle this development. We can’t just keep forcing it on him, he’s just going to get mad. But I’m not giving up either. For my sanity I need to be able to be away from him for more than an hour or two. I also have several work meetings I need to be at at the end of March and early April, so he needs to be able to be with Dad for several hours alone without getting very upset because he’s hungry. We have a different type of bottle we're going to try, and we're going to try using milk from the freezer stash that's more recent. Although the stuff we've been using is only a month old. We shall see. I’ve also read about just skipping the bottle and going right to a sippy cup or using an eyedropper. But we’re not giving up on the bottle just yet.
3 comments:
Thanks for the Toop update! That is so sad that her leg is getting so bad so quickly. Give her an extra pat from us here.
Poor Stian not liking the bottle! So a bigger nipple didn't help? Did you try and even bigger one? Like the one with 5 holes in the top or even the one with the slit instead of holes? Maybe the new kind of bottle will work. You are right, Stian needs to be able to be fed by someone else at times. Do you think maybe he wasn't actually hungry, but just wanted the comfort of nursing? I can imagine that it is hard to tell if he wants nursing for comfort or nursing for food.
Babies. They're so hard! Who knows what's going on in their cute heads!
No, we haven't tried an even bigger nipple. But if we're still having problems this weekend I will buy some. We're using the one with 3 holes right now.
I'm pretty sure he was hungry, at least last night. It had been almost 3 hours since he had last eaten, and he tends to eat every 1-2 hours during the day.
Maybe he's just getting to the age where he is starting to express an opinion - and he prefers not to be bottle fed! But we'll just have to keep at it.
We're trying to give him one bottle every night around dinner time. Unfortunately he also happens to be fairly cranky already this time of day from his lack of napping. But that's the only time Kris is around to do it.
Wait, opinions? You mean he might have an opinion about something that is different from yours? That is totally not fair! ;) As my sister says, I want my children to be independent, but not from me!
I'll keep my fingers crossed for a bigger nipple (isn't the #3 for a 3-month old? Given how much Stian eats, I might try the nipple for 5 or 6 month olds!). C'mon, Stian, bottles are great! Bottles are great! Bottles are great! Maybe a subliminal message tape will work.... ;)
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