Sad time right now....

Oooohhhh....it's been a long, hard day. You know when you've been crying for so long that it just completely exhausts you? Or you can break out in tears at the drop of a hat? (Like now.....and I was doing so good for a while......) OK, I can cry and type at the same time, right? Well, some of you may think this is a silly reason to get so emotional and to be honest, I never thought this would affect me so much.

Cassie, our boxer, is extremely sick right now and is at the animal hospital in pretty dire shape. To make a long story short (kind of), she's been out of sorts for a couple weeks, but just over the weekend she got worse. She wasn't eating or drinking. She wouldn't stand up, she was sleeping a lot more than usual & just had this look like something was wrong. Well, Sunday afternoon she was outside laying against the house directly in the sun. She never lies right in the sun.....she always finds the shade. Or if she's cold, she stays inside. But she was shaking & would hardly even raise her head. So Will's dad came over this morning and took her into the vet right when they opened. Well, we learned she was extremely dehydrated, had a temp of 95 (normal for dogs is about 100), had no whites to her eyes. They then found out she has an infection of the uterus called pyometra. It's common in older female dogs who haven't been spayed. The only treatment is surgery & with her being as sick as she is, this would be a very high risk. The vet has said they can't do anything until she's stabilized, they can't operate on a toxic dog. And of course this is a very expensive procedure, not something we can afford right now.

We were torn on what to do......do we keep her in the hospital and hope she gets better so they can operate? Or is she too old to recover from major surgery? Or what if she doesn't make it and we've spent all this money? After lots of talks with the vet and between ourselves, Cassies' slowly stabilizing throughout the day. Her temp has gone up and she seems more alert. They said she stood up by herself to go outside & they seem hopeful that she could make it through surgery. Will's dad has offered to pay for the surgery, so right now that's the plan for tomorrow.

But it's still 50/50.....we don't know how bad it is until they open her up and/or complete the operation. It's a roller coaster.......trying to decide how to tell the kids if she doesn't make it......getting over these feelings of guilt for not noticing sooner how sick she was (though the vet said we couldn't have done anything)......trying to stay positive and not so sad.... And again, it's been so hard for me not to get so down about it. I know lots of people will say it's just a dog, an animal & you shouldn't get so emotional. But she's been a part of our family since Noah was a baby. And I can't fathom telling the kids if she doesn't make it. They'll be crushed. But we're trying to be positive & hoping for the best. The latest update from the vet is that she's still doing good. That's all we can hope for. If you will, keep our sweet boxer in your prayers tonight, thanks.