Kodiak Bear – Alaskan Malamute Rocks On
KB has always lived in the mountains – lucky dog, lucky us! We used to hike almost everyday. We really miss that – I can’t hit the trail without him. So we do short outings now and to see the joy in his face as he hops around and sniffs and happily greets other people/dogs is wonderful. We wanted back-up in case he ever got too tired so we got him a snow sled. He wasn’t that into it at first, but treats will entice him to do anything. 😉
And soon he was just cruisin’ solo.
The thought of chemo for Kodiak was tough for us – it was just hard to think of injecting poison into him. But we did. In the end we felt like we had to do what we could to try and keep the cancer away. We had been advised by the oncologist that chemotherapy works best in the setting of microscopic or minimal disease so Kodibear was a good candidate. We knew we could proceed on a more natural path afterward. Mainly because he’s fur-challenged to begin with (more on that later), we worried a little about fur loss, but we learned that dogs don’t really lose their fur after chemo since they receive much smaller doses than humans.
He had 3 rounds of carboplatin, the first exactly 2 weeks after his amputation surgery and then every 3 weeks. Fortunately, our local vets were willing to administer the chemo. He did really well in that he was never ill and seemed to bounce back fairly quickly. He may have been a bit more tired than usual, but it’s hard to know since he was still adjusting to life on 3 legs. The hardest part was that he did NOT like going to the back room at the animal hospital. He was fine in the lobby, but poor thing had to be carried any further (by my husband) because he would not go willingly. (Prior to his amputation surgery he was never afraid to go to the vet). Even though he’s down one leg he can still resist moving very well. It was just obvious that he was stressed and scared. We felt so bad that we were making him go back there! 🙁 Our friend who was at the hospital with her own dog even heard him complaining (howling) during one of his chemo treatments. That just hurts my heart.
He had to be lightly sedated during the treatments (since he would not stay still enough) so he was always groggy when we picked him up. But he always had a good appetite and was able to eat little bits and even a smaller meal a few hours later. As I’ve mentioned before, he’s a big, whiney baby when coming off of morphine, and it was usually a good 24 hours before he was back to feeling normal.
We were also torn as to how many doses to give him. Three to five was the recommendation. We decided on the minimum because we really did not want to put him through any more stress. We wanted him to just be a doggy and have time to find his new normal as a tripawd without stressful interruptions. He’s not your happy-go-lucky dog that bounces back quickly and acts like nothing happened. He can be a silly guy quite often, but he’s also very serious. One of the many traits we love about him. Sure I may be anthropomorphizing, but I swear he over thinks stuff and gets bogged down. It was about 2 months before we started getting glimpses of the way he used to be. He just seemed to be more relaxed; he started flashing more smiles, laying on his right side (the side without the leg), and spent more time near us instead of alone in the bedroom. And he started playing with toys again. Yippee, we were so happy!
We are always thrilled to see him just being a dog and enjoying the little things the way only dogs can. He’s always teaching us about what’s important in life. These days we work on getting him “out of his head” with visits to the dog park and favorite trails with furry friends. We’ll post some of that real soon.