At some point last fall Jersey stumbled and fell as he walked out the back sliding door.  Took him to the vet and the X-ray showed a break.  The vet thought it would be ok to allow it to heal on it’s own and suggested that I re-Xray in a few months.  For whatever reason I spaced on the re-check and my vet never brought it up when I saw him for Jersey’s annual exam in february.  (By then, he was walking normally no pain, no swelling… and it healed on it’s own).

I suspect that this may have been the first sign (although there is no evidence of disease evident from the first set of x-rays)

Flash forward to the 3rd week of may.  I noticed that Jersey was limping a little bit… on a sunday afternoon.  I assume that he had re-injured his ankle, although  no one ‘saw’ him do anything.  I noticed a bit of swelling a few days later and started him off on some leftover previcox.  The following week, I brought him in to be checked out (It was bigger.. clearly not responding to the previcox).  JerZ’s normal vet was not available and I was given another weeks-worth of previcox.  I was away for work the next week, and I came back to an ankle that was almost the size of a golfball.

… something was wrong.

Jersey was seen by his regular vet a few days later… who remarked on how big the ankle was (it was NEVER that big when he broke it initially). He suggested we X-ray it to see if it was broken again.  A few days later, the x-ray revealed a unusually ‘repaired’ break and an additional tumor  … a fine needle biopsy reveled that he had Osteosarcoma (June 16, 2015).

After a lot of research and talking… and discussing.  I was moved to seek to provide the best palliative care that I could find for him.  And the research was clear … bone cancers are excruciatingly painful (he was already taking high doses of tramadol … and barely walking around… not using his foot) and the best way to make a dog comfortable was by removing the pain.  Removing the pain involved amputating his diseased, painful leg.  I made the decision to amputate his leg on June 19 and scheduled his surgery for June 24th.

I admit to behing horribly fearful of the coming weeks … and recognized that amputation (w/o chemo, radiation) meant that it was essential that we start cherishing every moment and ensuring that we made happy memories…because we may not have very many days left, together.

We started this epic summer by visiting a friend and the beach that we spent ALOT of time with during his late puppyhood-teenager years.  We ventured back to Providence, RI and visited with one of the friends that JERSEY made, while I was in grad school.  So yeah.. we went to see Joanne, Ed and their furry-son Junior.  While there, Jersey enjoyed a huge plate of meatballs and I had dinner… chatted and then took Jersey to Tillinghast Beach…. (aka. RISD beach)