The heaviest thing on my mind at the current moment is the declining health of my Pit Bull "Vinny Man".
Some back ground on Vinny. He is a beautiful blue and white Pit Bull. I had adopted him from my shelter in West Jordan in September of 2010. Vinny was my first abuse case, being kenneled for the first 11 months of his life with no interaction. We had him for approximately a month after that in our quarantine kennels. He was a mess, his white was far from white and everyone else deemed him "scary" looking. I fell instantly in love with him. I spent that month making sure he had an extra fluffy blanket and an extra cookie in the morning. A few weeks before Vinny was released from quarantine pending the owner releasing his rights to him, I had to put my German Shepherd Zuka down due to a pancreatic problem. The day that Vinny was available for adoption we ran out of space to keep him available to the public. I was faced with the decision to take him home or let the shelter put him down. Of course my tender heart couldn't let that happen...
A few months ago he developed a bump on the very top of his spine. The first time I took him to see Doc (Dr Anderson at Southeast Valley Veterinary Clinic - my old place of employment) we decided that it was most likely a cyst from an injury. Vinny likes to rough house with my parents dog. Doc said that if it was indeed a cyst it should go away on its own. Slowly Vinny became more and more like Quasimodo. This lump didn't seem to effect him in any way, not neurologically and didn't seem to be painful. Then Saturday morning, I had been staying with my parents dogs while they were out of town, and Vinny came inside unable to use his hind leg. I panicked, but again he didn't seem painful, it just dangled there like he had no control over it. Again, we went to go see Doc. This time we xrayed his back and with in 30 seconds of the image loading on the computer screen Doc gave me the news I had been dreading. Vinny has a spinal tumor that is growing between his disks, because of its placement, it was inoperable. Doc suggested a biopsy to see what type of tumor we were dealing with.
Monday morning I dropped Vinny off for a biopsy. Now we just wait the results.
All of this has been extremely hard on me, yet some how Vinny still has a silly smile on his face and wags his tail. Its hard to think that I wont be able to spend 10+ years with such an amazing animal. I am not going to make any drastic decisions until he doesn't smile anymore, until then, keep Vinny Man in your thoughts. Such as rough start to life, at least the last year and a half have been better.
No comments:
Post a Comment