2016 has been a really hard year so far. January started out ok, but we had been caring for my parents cute little dog and he was yelping one night and I just thought he had hurt his paw so I carried him downstairs with me that night so that he could sleep with us. He woke me up at around 1:30 am yelping so loud and it looked like he was having trouble breathing so I got up to see what was going on and he could NOT move his back legs at all, they were paralyzed. I text my parents and asked what they wanted me to do but it was in the middle of the night so I just held him next to me and cuddled him and prayed that if he was going to die that he would die before everyone got up in the morning. He made it through the night, so when my dad got off work that morning he came over to check it out and we called my brother-in-laws uncle who is a Vet and he told us to bring him in, we took him in and he said that he had a spinal cord injury, "what the crap" I thought. The Vet gave him some steroid shots and told us to leave him there for a night or two, so we left him there, he continued to get steroid shots and we brought him back home that next Saturday. We had a follow up appt with the Vet the next Saturday and he was not improving at all, he gave him another round of shots and told us to come back a week later. We had to take him outside every so often to help him use the bathroom and since he couldn't feel anything we had to press on his bladder to make him go. We went back to the Vet a week later and he was not improving at all and he was losing Muscle in those back legs, the Vet suggested to put him down, we were very sad and asked if we could keep him one more week and he was ok with that. We brought him back home and cared for him for one more week and ended up putting him down on January 30, 2016 we will miss him like crazy he was the best dog, and Jaren loved him and he loved Jaren. It was actually a peaceful experience, we all felt it was the best thing to do for him. He was in a lot of pain.
While all of this was going on with the dog I had gone in to the Dr for my yearly physical, and it went ok, except a few things, the Dr was looking at my back and noticed a black head so he was picking at it to get it out and noticed another spot next to it that worried him a little bit, he said I would like to biopsy that because you don't really have anybody that can watch it really close. So I made an appt for a biopsy and had it done, and the results came back as positive for Basal Cell Carcinoma (skin cancer) holy crap that was a punch in the gut. I was nervous and scared, the Dr reassured me that it wasn't the kind that will kill you but that we needed to take care of it. I made an appointment for February 1 to have the skin cancer spot removed it wasn't that bad but I was in a little bit of pain that night because of the incision and the stitches.
Tuesday morning February 2 Jaren woke up not feeling well, his blood sugars were really high, the meter read 485 I gave him some insulin and went to my crossing and came home to check it again before I went to the school job, it had only gone down to 474 I didn't want to leave him so I changed his insulin pump site and gave him more insulin and checked it again 30 mins later, it was now down to 425 I figured it was going down and he was sleeping so I could run to work, at 12:05 pm from the home health care nurse concerned because of the way he was acting and the way he was talking and his blood sugar had gone back up to 451. I left work and came home to discuss with the nurse what to do and we decided it would be best to take him in to the ER for some fluids if nothing else. I took him to the IMC and they took us right back and started IV's and did blood work. They were worried because his sugars were still high and when the blood tests came back his white blood cell count was over 26,000 they thought maybe he had an infection somewhere, so they admitted us to the hospital on the 8th floor and started figuring out what was going on, they did a CT scan and found that his pancreas was inflamed so they wanted an ultrasound to look for gall stones. No gall stones but he had pancreatitis, and it is painful. They took him off all liquids and all food even water, and kept him on IV fluids until Friday. They started liquids and food back into his diet very slowly and we finally got to come home on Sunday night. I am beyond exhausted but life has to go back to normal even if we have to get use to a new normal. The nurse told me that he tried to sneak out again this time and so I was talking to my sister about it and she said, " no, he didn't try, he did get out they found him clear over in another building, he had followed a volunteer out" I couldn't believe it, again he had wandered out on his own, I told them to make sure and set the bed alarm. Wednesday I had to work for a few hours and while I was at work I checked my email and thank goodness I was there alone, because I found out that they were not able to get all of the cancer and I have to go back and get more cut out, I had a meltdown a little bit in my office.
Hopefully this is not a sign of how 2016 will be, I don't know if I can hang on the whole year if it is like this. I am so thankful for Dr's that help him and I am very thankful that my Dr was in tune with my body and was able to find the cancer early so that it didn't become a problem. I am thankful that my kids are older and are able to help out. I am so thankful that we ended up putting the dog down because he would have been locked up all alone all day for a week because we were at the hospital. I am teaching a lesson on Sunday about adversity BUT I didn't really need adversity right now just so I could teach about it. HAHA I guess the only way we can go now is UP right?! something has to go our way soon!!
