April 30th, 2020.

Yesterday was Akeela’s official 6 week amputation-aversary. One thing this experience has taught me is to always expect the unexpected. You never know what’s waiting for you around the corner….

Akeela had her 5th rehab session (laser therapy and acupuncture) and her second round of Carboplatin chemotherapy. The clinic I found has both of these services in one location, so it’s a convenient one stop shop for us. Between rehab and chemo, the Oncologist gave me a call. During rehab they found that an abscess between her toes on her back leg had exploded. Oh goody. This is the same foot that she has been incessantly chewing on for the past few weeks. I have had to keep a sock on her foot around the clock to prevent her from going to town on it. She’s chewed and eaten 2 of the socks, so we’re now down to 2 – thank goodness they come in 4 packs and we only need one.

So now they wonder…. did she pick at her foot so much that it formed an abscess? or was she picking at her foot because there was an abscess? Whose to say, really. So they cleaned it up for us and sent us off with antibiotics – another medication to add to her daily regiment.

About 4 days ago I noticed that Akeela had some wet spots on her bed. After examining her body and the position of moisture, I determined that she had peed the bed. She has never done this before. It was very peculiar, because it didn’t seem like she had even realized what had happened. She has now done this about 6 times – usually it happens late at night or early in the morning. Dr. Downing believes that this may be due to heavy sedation (she gets her largest dose of Gabapentin at night – 1200 mg). I have a follow up appointment with her tomorrow, so hopefully we can find a solution for this. I’ve currently lined all of her bedding with plastic bags and spare sheets. She absolutely hates baths, so I’ve resorted to wiping her body off with a wet rag and water/baking soda mixture. Just one more list of bizarre ailments to add to the list ….

At 2 am this morning I had the pleasure of waking up to the sounds of Akeela vomiting. I swear, nothing gets you out of bed faster! She had also peed the bed … not just a little pee like normal … the bed was soaked. So I took her out to potty, cleaned her up, swapped out her bedding, and gave her a Cerenia (anti nausea) tab. The vet said vomiting/diarrhea was a common side effect of chemotherapy. She didn’t show any symptoms the after her first treatment, so it took me by surprise this time.

A few hours later I woke up to the sounds of explosive poo in the hallway. What a morning. So round two of taking her potty, cleaning her up, swapping out bedding, and giving her a Metronidazole (anti diarrhea) pill. And naturally she couldn’t just aim for one rug..  she had to get it all over 3 different rugs throughout the house. And now that I’m siting here reflecting on the incident … I’m realizing that I forgot her poo is considered toxic after chemotherapy. I was definitely scrubbing the rug out with my hands and a sponge … so … hope I don’t die ….

Well back to the story: I gave her the evening round of medication at 8 pm and she didn’t throw up until 2 am, so I figured her body had digested it in that time. I didn’t want to give her more pain medicine, since she already shows signs of extreme sedation at night. Well. Apparently I was wrong. She had returned back to her panting/pacing/whining/yelping routine. It lasted from around 9 am until 11 am. And of course now that she is nauseous, she is resistant to taking any kinds of medication – even when they are disguised in delicious Greenies pill pockets. So that leaves me to open her wolf trap and shove about 6 pills down her throat with my hand. Isn’t recovery fun?

I guess after all things considered … at least her episode of diarrhea and vomiting is considered a ‘normal’ side effect of chemotherapy? I could definitely live without the exploding abscess, screams of pain, and bed wetting though. About time the Doggy Gods cut us a break.

Maintaining Akeela’s pain medication schedule is quite the feat in itself. She is currently taking medication 4 different times throughout the day. They are spaced around 4-5 hour intervals. If I give them to her too close to a meal or an hour too late, it will result in about 2-3 hours of agony for her. This completely varies depending on the dog, so it’s been a learning experience trying to figure out the exact schedule for her. Dr. Downing said that the fact that she still has those yelping/panting/pacing episodes means that we are not quite at the Gabapentin dosage that we need to be at. I have been incredibly fortunate to work at home throughout the Coronavirus, so I’m able to clock out here and there and console her if she has these episodes. I would not be able to do that if I was at the office. So I do feel grateful that I can at least be at home with her while we work out her proper medication dosage.  Eventually we will hopefully get to the point where her medication can be spaced further apart, but as of now, I cannot do anything that would keep me away from her for longer than 4 hours. It has been a big responsibility, but manageable for me given the current circumstances.

She has come a long way from where she was a week ago, but she is still not having the quality of life that I had expected post-surgery. I will do everything I can to keep fighting for her, but it is painful to see her in so much distress. Our road to recovery has just been a continuous number of set backs. I can’t wait for the day that she is back to her normal (but now 3 legged) self and I can look back and think “Wow, that was miserable, but at least we made it through.”