I have to say we skipped an entire day while he was in surgery on Tuesday. It's ok though, because sometimes it's more difficult to relay things as they happen and better to relay it as a past event. At least you get impressions and thoughts that fill in the blanks afterwards.
Here's the scoop: he went into surgery around 1:00PM on the 10th and was out and in recovery around 4:00PM. Not that they did surgery the entire time, but we heard from the chief vet. as to the outcome of the surgery probably around 3:30PM but the time doesn't really matter. He was out of the surgery and doing ok. Those were the words we wanted to hear. The other words were not so great. I have to say the pit in my stomach felt like a cavern once I heard what the doctor said and I wanted to ask more questions but he was obviously trying to stave them off until we really knew "more" as he said, his last words to me were stay positive...
So here is what they ended up doing, which to me seems a bit like we didn't know the whole truth going into it but they tried to be up front about what they were intending on doing, but as he said, we are going to do all we can to get clean margins, whatever it takes, so we have to accept that what ended up happening was a variation on the theme.
They removed most of the upper right portion of his jaw. They took out the cheek bone which was not part of the original plan and they severed or removed, I'm not sure which, the nerves running along the area where the cheek bone was, another part that was unknown at the time. They removed the canine tooth in the front all the way to the back tooth and then closed it up and he was done. The vet's statement was, we are "relatively" pleased with the reconstruction portion of the surgery, meaning what they took out, but when they were cleaning out the bone under the eye, the bone that makes up the eye socket was "soft" bone...they biopsied it and we have not heard back what it is. The vet. said, I'm not sure what it is, that's why we did the biopsy, but stay positive...so we have been staying as positive as we can, given that we didn't know he'd lose his cheek bone, or have the nerves severed or find soft bone...the vet was in a hurry to get another surgery done, and he said, I will talk to you again. But up until today (Wednesday)we haven't heard back from him.
Now to the evening of the same day as surgery, we hear from the vet/student Rick that Mack is somewhat awake, on pain meds, and they will attempt to give him some food that night. Apparently this is much earlier than expected to try this, but they are concerned about his ability to actually open his mouth now. So we don't hear that he actually ate some food that night, 12 hours after surgery, until the following day, but given that they said within 24 hours, this is pretty darn good to hear that they are at least attempting this so early. This is one tough and very hungry boy.
Wednesday morning, post surgery and almost right on time at 8:30AM, Rick, student/vet. calls and says that Mack has been able to eat soft food with some kibble thrown in, gone to the bathroom, walked outside in the rain, but no bowel movement, but seems to be tolerating the food and they feel good about his recovery so far. Good way to start the day but he says he will definitely call us later on.
Later on Wednesday right on time at 6:00PM, Rick calls and says that Mack's doing very well. He's on target to have the fluids reduced by half, the pain meds converted to pill form, the food intake is good, he is walking fine and seemingly ok at this point. When asked about the biopsy from the surgery I suddenly feel as if he is evasive and knows the answer but says he doesn't have that information. I have a sixth sense that he does know but is not allowed to tell me, so he quickly says that he will be seeing Dr. Bacon and discussing this with him and also whether Mack is on schedule to come home on Thursday, Friday or Sat. We will wait and see, they seem to have long hours and exhausting situations and that is probably why we haven't heard back from Dr. Bacon, but it is a bit disconcerting to not know what we're dealing with. I would pray that Dr. Bacon would be willing to tell us the truth, so that we can absorb it and accept it and I would prefer to know what we face, long before coming to pick him up so we can mourn in our own way at home. But still there is no answer on the biopsy. I don't like having to go up there and be given the bad news in a strange place when I first see my dog. But alas this may be the case.
Fast forward to early evening of the same day and they've done their rounds so we receive our third call from Rick the student/vet and he tells us that Mack is doing so well that he can come home tomorrow as soon as we can come up. This is really great news, but for some reason I've taken this news as bad. I haven't heard directly from the chief veterinarian about the biopsy and I feel that maybe they are getting Mack to us as fast as they can, so I ask Rick about this and if this isn't too soon. He assures me that they are not "rushing" him out and that he will do much better at home and he doesn't need the hospital care now. If he can eat and drink on his own, then he will do better at home where he can rest because there is a lot of activity at the hospital and it's a strange environment for them, so they really don't sleep that well there. I'm suspicious of this explanation and I kind of wait for the other shoe to drop, as if I'm waiting for him to tell me that they really want him home because he doesn't have much time left and we need to have him with us, or that time is short so come get him...I can't help but go there since we are still in the dark about the biopsy and even in this conversation no mention is made of my previous question. It's as if Rick is hoping I won't ask about it again and I don't. He doesn't volunteer either. So we are going up there not knowing the outcome of the biopsy and that is ominous on it's own. If it had been good news, they would have shared that with us and given us a huge thumbs up as to his prognosis, but I don't get that impression.
So we will pick up our poor beaten up and rather ravaged dog and take him home with his bottles of pills and instructions on how to care for him and we will probably find out then what they didn't want to tell us before...It makes our decision to do this all the more difficult to accept because the outcome was less than expected, he lost more than we thought, and we face the idea that the surgery, although his last chance, was not enough. It breaks our hearts, but then again we have to remember that we had nothing else to try and this was our only chance. We did it for him, to give him the most chance that was left, which now that we're here, wasn't all that much. It will be rough to think about his having to deal with the loss of half his jaw, nerve damage and other awful effects, but we must remember that he has osteosarcoma, and that isn't going away. We will at the very least have him home to give him hugs and be the only comfort he has. He'll be home and we pray that will be enough for the days ahead.
No comments:
Post a Comment