First post

Good afternoon to anyone who is reading this blog. My name is Jenn and my 11 year old Black Lab Mastiff mix has just underwent a right hind leg amputation. I guess it all began around my birthday last year when I noticed a little lump during a camping trip with my boyfriend. We thought nothing of it at the time because he has numerous fatty benign spots around his body and then little by little, it started to increase in size. Still thinking nothing of it, we took him to our regular vet to get it aspirated and the outcome of that was uneventful. They could not find anything serious enough so we just forgot about it. Fast-forward to my birthday in September of this year when it had reached the size of a softball I knew that this was not something I could let stay and not get to the bottom of. My boyfriend and I took him back to the vet where they once again aspirated it to find spindle cells. Then the vet suggested to make an appointment with the Oncologist at a local vet specialty and I was on the fence because at the time, it was not bothering him so I held off. Around Thanksgiving time, he had licked the hair completely off the area to the point where it was starting to open up so I went ahead and finally scheduled that oncology appointment because for all intent purposes, Duke may be a senior dog, but you would never know by watching him run around on the daily. During his consultation, I heard the words I was dreading, “Aputation.” My boyfriend and I scheduled a CT scan to make sure the cancer had not spread into his lungs, or lymph nodes and once those results were in that it was just localized to his leg I thought the choice would be easy. It was far from it. I cried daily thinking of how much Duke would hate me for taking his leg from him and constantly asked my family and friends if I was making the right decision. I felt like I was betraying my dog and that he would never forgive me. It was honestly the toughest decision I have ever made in my life. I knew in my heart that he deserved better than to be stuck wearing a cone of shame forever, or to possibly have the open wound abscesses. So, four days ago he had his amputation surgery. The first 48 hours were rough for all of us. My boyfriend had a dog growing up with a lame leg so he was somewhat familiar with how Duke would be. I was and still am clueless on what to expect but I can tell you all that Duke is just about back to his normal fun-loving self. We can barely keep up with him on his potty breaks outside because it hasn’t fazed him that he is down a limb. My happy boy is here and we just have to make sure that we can give him the best years of his life while we have him.