lyndon baines

Today is the 2nd day since Lyndon has been home.  We had a long night last night.  I felt so bad about the pain he was in that I opted not to put on his cone collar.  That, of course, meant that every time he made the slightest movement I had to wake up to make sure he wasn’t going after his incision.  So, Lyndon slept well, but I didn’t sleep much at all.  Lyn’s definitly in more pain than he was in yesterday.  He is also more anxious, wandering around more and looking like he’s not quite sure what to do with himself.  I can tell that he’s going to have to build up strength in his remaining hind leg, at the moment he gets tired easily and the leg starts to shake a bit with the strain.  Still, he is doing better than I had expected and I havent left his side for more than a short bathroom break in 30 hours.

Fifi, Scamp and Lyndon before the surgery

The real problem has been my other two quadrapawds.  They are not accepting of this whole separation thing, and they have voiced their disaproval and confusion non-stop for two days.  This morning Lyndon and I were serenaded with blood-curtling howling for an hour before I had to tell them to stop.  Since then I have had Lyndon baracaded in the family room with me and the other two (Fifi and Scampers) free to roam the rest of the house.  Of course, they are only interested in getting into the family room.  They are driving me crazy and occasionally stressing Lyndon out.  Its hard doing this process, with three dogs on opposite sides of th fence, by myself.  Thank God I don’t have to work for these next two weeks or this would be impossible.

In support of old cliches, “today is the first day of the rest of our lives.”  Lyndon came home from the hospital today!  The surgery went really well, the vet said that at one point his heart rate went up a bit, but that it quickly corrected itself without any assistance needed.  Yesterday I was totally inconsolable… the word “mutilation” kept running through my head and my guilt was at 100%.  It helped to dig myself into work to distract myself, but in between tasks I fought not to want to go rescue him before the surgery.  Then when the surgery was done, my only thought was, “Oh my God, what have I done?!”

Today I was expecting to be horrified, guilty and down right ill.  I was so nervous in the waiting room that I thought I was going to vomit, and then… there he was.  He came hopping into the room all excited and looking around and doing fine.  The incision site was not nearly as aweful as I expected.  A lot of the pictures I had seen of other dogs was much worse.  I’m kind of wondering if the difference was that those dogs got staples and lyndon got sutures.  He had an oozy spot where they had been giving him local anesthetics through a kind of cathater all night, but the vet said it was supposed to be that way.  The surgeon also left a small muscle pad on the back of his hip so that when he sits it won’t feel awkward.  I was so happy to see him up and about that the scar didn’t really bother me at all. 

Since being home he’s gone potty, eaten his normal food and taken a nice nap.  I’ve decided that i’d like this blog to help other people who have to go through this process, and so I’m going to add pictures every day of his recovery (other dogs’ pictures helped prepare me for the shock, and I think having seen others it made it suprisingly happy to see that his wound was not as bad). 

Today is a bit sad, but I am feeling a bit more pawsitive about the whole process.  All of the comments and support I have gotten from the tripawds community has helped me immensely.  I feel that I am no longer going through this process alone, and I am so grateful to have found this site.  So, thank you to all of those who have been sending Lyndon and I your best wishes and prayers; they are much appreciated.

I was hoping to get some good cuddle time with Lyndon in today, but he has been wanting to stay outside catching a bit of heat.  He loves warmth, he even insists on being blowdried in the morning.  Oh well, I guess I’ll get lots of cuddle time in the next few weeks.  Tonight I’m going to rearrange the family room for him to have a comfortable/safe spot to recoup in.  Thanks to all those blogs that gave me ideas on how best to accomplish this.  Till tomorrow…

I gave Lyndon his pre-surgery bath today.  My other dogs try to swim over the water, but Lyndon just gets stiff as a board; like a cat.  I felt so sad washing his leg, knowing that by thursday it will be in the bottom of some biohazard waste bin in the back room of a necropsy lab.  I actually had to go into a biowaste storage once… it was horrifying.  I’ve been spending the day looking up pictures of amputation scars and reading early-stages recovery stories.  Needless to say I am emotionally exhausted.  The worst part is that he has no idea what’s about to happen to him… and I can’t explain why I’ve made the decision to do this scary, painful thing to him. 

More than anything I think that I am afraid he will die in the surgery, and in an attempt to prolong his life and happiness, I will have actually killed him when he would still be able to survive if I hadn’t done this.  If he dies I don’t think I will be able to ever forgive myself….

Hi my name is Ananda and My dog, Lyndon, has synovial sarcoma.  I’m sure that this is not the most fancy or formal blog that can be found in the tripawds site, but this is my first attempt at a blog and I’m still trying to figure out the system. 

I joined tripawds this week because I’ve been told that it is a very helpful and supportive community of doggie parents that have had to go through the amputation process.  My little miniature pinscher, Lyndon, is going to have his hind leg amputated this coming wednesday and I am having a very difficult time dealing with the guilt of putting him through a surgery, a long recovery and years of only having three legs.  After reading some of the other blogs in this site I realize that I am very lucky, as Lyndon will not require any chemotherapy.  He has a synovial sarcoma (which is cancer of the joint fluid) around his left hock joint.  When I first had the growth looked at, my vet thought that it was a cyst because she was able to extract fluid from the lump.  So, relieved that it wasn’t cancer, we had the “cyst” surgically removed.  The tissue was interwoven though his muscles, bone and achilles tendon.  When they did the biopsy of what they removed they found out that the growth was actually cancer.  Two months later the tumor was completely back and bigger than it had been when we removed it.  I tried to avoid amputation, but it is the only thing I can do now.

Lyndon is 12 years old and I am terrified that he will not be able to adjust to life with only three legs, not to mention the idea of surgery is a terrible one. If anyone could offer me a little encouragment on this absolutly aweful process I would sure appreciate it.  Thanks, Lyndy B’s mama.