Baxter's health
Three weeks ago, Baxter starts poopin' in the house. He's never done that. Then about about two weeks ago, he's throwing up. One night he threw up five times in 24 hours. There were bits of wood & a Polly Pocket plastic shoe in the puke, along with lots of dog food and a lot of hair. But we took him to the doc on a Thursday, who said "put him on rice & ground beef, and we'll check this little tumor thing to see if it's cancerous and we'll run blood work. If he's still throwing up over the weekend, take him to the ER for X-rays." Blood work is clean, tumor is non-cancerous. Over the weekend he's still throwin' up. I take him to the ER. X-rays come back clear. Here they are for your viewing.

Oh, weight history: April 2007 he was 56 pounds. December 2007, 48. Last week, 40. Still throws up off and on this week. Today throws up more and he's dazed and clearly hurting from his arthritis. We haven't given him his buffered aspirin since the puking started, so he has a lot of trouble going up the stairs. He's now on super bland Science Diet I/D food. Threw that up, this morning. He's walking around dazed and in some pain, 'cause he has a lot of trouble lying down, and when does lie down, he gets up again a few minutes later, like he's not comfortable on the floor. Not crying or anything, though. So we think maybe today's the day that he doesn't come back from the vet. But how can you know that, y'know? Amy & I decide we need to go to the ER and talk to the doc.

So we talk to Quinn, all of us crying. Quinn: "Is it OK? Is he OK? Is it OK?" Me: "No, sweetie, it's not." Quinn: "Will he get better? Do dogs get better?" Me: "We'd like him to, but maybe he can't. Maybe he's going to die soon. We're going to go to the hospital and see what the doctor says. He may have something else we can try to make him better, but he might have to help Baxter die." So Quinn goes to Aunt Julie's house, and Amy and I head to hospital.

He's down to 38 pounds. Doc agrees Baxter is unhappy, out of it, starving, etc. Doc tries to feed him, to see if he's got any appetite. She has a little can of I/D cat food, and scoops some out with a tongue depressor and puts it in front of Baxter. He sniffs it, and then goes straight for the can itself. "Yeah, hey, that little glob is nice, but I would like the whole can, OK? Thanks." So he eats half the can right out of her hand and the doc says this is a good thing.

We talk about what we can do going forward. We know we don't want to do anything heroic. We sure don't want to put him through surgery. I mean, he's 14. Maybe 15. Got him from Save-A-Pet and they weren't sure of his age.

Doc looks at all the things we've tried, and says there's one more thing we can try. The anti-puking stuff he'd been given by his regular doc wouldn't handle esophagitis, if he's got an irritated esophagus from the buffered aspirin for his arthritis. Thinks that if it's esophagitis, Prilosec will take care of it. If not, it's something else we don't know what it is, and never will. So we agree that's worth a shot. We don't want to call it too early, but we also don't want him to go through pain/suffering. Doc says we'd know in a few days with the Prilosec. Either things will improve, or they won't, but if they don't, at least it won't be too long that we're dragging things out.

So we brought him home, and we give him many frequent feedings. He should be getting about 2.5 cans per day for caloric intake, but we'll be starting small. I've given him two half cans since we came back (about eight hours), although he's only eaten half the last serving I gave him.

He just came back in from outside where I assume he was playing Dog Of The Night, where he walks around the lawn, looking for miscreants. He still looks kind of dopey, but he's also had his flashes of relative normalcy since we got back, too.