Biskit

I originally wrote this a few days ago....It was very long and very specific....Pretty much more than anyone cared to know about....So I did my best to shorten it up and get to the point.....

Biskit, one of our beagles, will be 12 years old in just a few weeks. At least that's what we say. We really don't know when her birthday is. I made her official birthday July 1st since that was our first day we could call her ours.

Kerry and I were living in Moore, OK going to OU. One summer day in 2002 I walked outside to find Biskit running up to me. She was an adorable dog and was so friendly and just melted my heart. I took her to the backyard since we already had 3 dogs in the house. I told Kerry that a beagle found me (as usual) and we needed to find the owner. Luckily, we did find the owner a few hours later. They lived just about 3 streets over from us. But those hours were precious to me. Biskit and I had this instant connection that I really can't explain. But I cried when I had to return her to her owner. Kerry made fun of me since I had only met her just a few hours ago!! Sadly, the guy asked if we just wanted to keep her and deep in my heart I knew I wanted her, but again, we already had 3 dogs.

But Biskit managed to find us 2 more times in just a short period of time and I was angry at these owners for not paying attention to this sweet dog. They continued to throw her in their backyard and she would continue to get out. After finding her for the 3rd time, I did ask if we could keep her. He gladly said yes and wanted to know if I wanted him to bring over her dog bowl and collar and I nicely said "No, thanks."

I couldn't believe we now had 4 dogs living with us; something Kerry and I never planned on but I knew she belonged to us and she was now where she was meant to be. So we took her to 2 different vets to get their opinion on whether she had been spayed or not and to get an approximation on her age. Both vets said 4 or 5 years old. So we made her 5 years old and her official birthday on July 1st.

Instantly we realized Biskit had some issues. She had numerous seizures daily. I couldn't even count how many in that first month that we had her. Again, I was so angry at the previous owners who threw her in their backyard never paying attention to her and who had allowed her to live a life like this. We immediately got her started on seizure medication which decreased the number of seizures she has. She still continues to have them but only a few times a month. She has taken medicine for this the last 7 years.

We also realized what horrible allergies Biskit had. She would gnaw and chew at her belly and paws. She would scratch and itch until she bled. So for the last 7 years, she has been on special allergy dog food that runs $80 a bag!!!! Crazy I know, but it was amazing to see the difference it made from just eating this food. I can't imagine her not being on it and knowing how bad her quality of life when her allergies were bad.

I know we aren't the best dog owners in the world, but if you know Kerry and I at all, you do know what huge animal lovers we are. We sure try our best to give our dogs everything they need. Yes, we have 4 dogs that all sleep with us. They go to the lake with us---they are a huge part of our lives. Before kids, they were our babies. They continue to be but we had to make room for some kiddos now:)

The reason I'm writing this is because writing things makes me feel better. It has put a smile on my face to reminisce about Biskit and how she became a party of our family.But our sweet Biskit probably doesn't have that much longer on this earth. She is almost 12 years old and I knew this was coming. Sage will be 12 in October---Hunter 12 next February---Parker 9 next February. So all our dogs are getting old and I know the next few years will be rough for Kerry and I.

Biskit has been having some issues for awhile now. I remember taking her to the vet back in October because she started peeing in the house sometimes and seemed to not be able to control it. They treated her for a urinary tract infection and we went on our way. But it never got any better. She contined to have peeing issues. Not in the house all the time (thank goodness), but she would go outside and squat for several mintues, walk a few steps and squat again. She might squat to pee 10 times in a short period of time. We took her back and they tried a different medication. Then we tried another round. Nothing was helping her. We knew our next step was to see if she had kidney stones.

So 2 weeks ago today, I took her in and we did some X-Rays to only find that there were no kidney stones. This was good news, but still didn't help us with her problem. They gave us another medication which I knew wasn't going to help but it was worth a shot. BUT the vet mentioned a knot on her belly. I noticed it because Biskit had really been chewing at it and it really wasn't that noticable at the time. She wanted us to be watching it because it looked like mammary gland cancer to her. So I was completely shocked and thrown off guard. Well this tumor has probably at least doubled in size in just these 2 short weeks.

The owner of this vet clinic is a good friend of Kerry's dad so he wanted us to come back in to do an ultrasound since the X-Rays didn't show any kidney stones. Kerry took Biskit around lunchtime on Monday. The ultrasound looked great. Her kidney's looked great. So the vet was still pretty perplexed. To make a long story short, he found a large tumor on her urethra. He was able to quickly diagnose Biskit with TCC (transitional cell carcinoma), a rare form urinary tract cancer in dogs. Bladder cancer is very unusual, comprising only 1-2% of all cancers in dogs. This vet had only seen this a handful of times in all his years.

So basically the symptoms are like that of a urinary tract infection. So we've been treating her with medication that wasn't helping because there was really just a large tumor growing in her. This tumor is big and swollen and inflammed making her feel like she has a very full bladder hence the need to squat and pee continously while she is outside. Kerry and I were very sad and it wasn't something we expected. I knew something bad was going on and I really thought the bad news was going to be from the tumor growing on her belly. They went ahead and biopsied that as well. And we found out this morning that the tumor on her belly is also cancer. We dont' know if it's breast cancer or related to the TCC. We won't know that because they would have to remove the entire mass to determine that and it's really just not something that needs to be done. This cancerous tumor is on the left side near her back left leg and she limps and sometimes won't walk on that leg. It's gotten so big that it's hard for her to sit or lay down comfortably. I really wish they could remove the tumor but the vet said it will just grow right back because it's very aggressive.

So where do we go from here? Well we went to Harvest Drug to fill a prescription. It's called piroxicam. It's Biskit's best chance at reducing the size of her tumor in her urethra and it should hopefully reduce the tumor on her belly as well. If it does shrink, then maybe she won't have that urge to always go pee and her quality of life will be improved. Surgery to remove the cancerous tumors is really not an option right now. They are both too big and it would be too invasive. They would have to remove too much tissue including good tissue and would most likely have to amputate her back leg. No vets do that here. We would have to go to OKC and have it done. I guess all we have right now is to wait and see what happens. Hopefully in 2 weeks we will see some good results from the medication. This medicine is hard on the dogs so we are praying her body is able to handle it. So far, after a few days, she is doing pretty good. There are specific symptoms we are watching for and hopefully none of those appear.

So just keep our sweet Biskit in your thoughts. I just pray we have a few more months with her. She is such a special dog to me. It's just different with her. She has never been like our other dogs. I think they have all been spoiled from the very beginning. She has been grateful everyday of her life with us the past 7 years. I just hope I know when its time to let her go. I don't want to hang on just because I want her around. I pray I am able to have the strength to say goodbye to her. And I know she is going to be missed sooooo much the day she is gone.