Dog years

We have an aging pack of dogs.  Losing Molly was a shock and was premature, but she was no spring chicken.  Bremo is 11, Cabell is 12, Zachary is maybe 7 or 8 already.  Trooper is our youngster, I guess, and he's about 5 anyway, I'd have to check.


It seems that our boys are all on the same vet schedule, which is poor planning on my part in terms of cost anyway.  Today I took Bremo and Zachary to the vet for annual physicals and vaccines.  Zach is in pretty good shape except for his chronic shepherd problems, pannus in his eyes and his whole digestive system.  He's always been a little stiff in the joints and the vet thought he could be starting to develop some arthritis, but there was no crackling in the joints at least.

By this chart, Bremo is 86 years old and Cabell is 93
(double click the chart to enlarge if needed)

Bremo has been on thyroid meds for quite a while and he's continued to show some muscle wasting, although his weight was up from our last visit.  Where you notice it is on his head.  The bones are more pronounced and not covered by as much flesh as they had been, giving him a bony and pointed head, although he still loves it when you pet him. 



I ended up leaving Bremo there for the day because the vet thought his liver felt abnormal and she found a mass on one of his legs that she wanted to check out. 


The phone call was one of those good news/bad news sort of things.  The lump on the leg was just a fatty thing, not likely to cause a problem.  But xrays and ultrasound of his abdomen showed that the liver was not right, most likely due to cancer.  I can't see putting an 11 year old dog through chemo that won't cure the disease, particularly in light of the fact that he's not really displaying any clinical signs at this time.  Surgery isn't really an option because the abnormal tissue wasn't confined to one part of the liver and she said that by this point it had likely spread anyway.  We will do some supplements to help support the liver and keep it functioning normally as long as possible. 


He's still eating like a rottweiler and enjoys life so we will consider that a win and take it one day at a time.