Affaire's Formula One, "Indy"

Indy was lost to bone cancer.

He was diagnosed on September 6, 2010. He'd been limping for a couple of days on his right rear leg. Being an older dog, I assumed that he probably stepped in a hole and maybe had a soft tissue injury. The vet that saw him that day, didn't see it on the x-rays, but called later to tell me that the radiologist had seen a bone tumor.

Indy was put on Rimadyl initially and since the pain was managed very well with that alone, I didn't give him any other pain meds. He was on Rimadyl for about 10 days and I realized that his limp was no longer noticable at all. I thought that was a bit odd since we typically expect bone cancer to get worse pretty quickly.

About 2 weeks into this, I was giving him breakfast and realized I didn't put his Rimadyl chewables in the food. I decided to see how he did without it. I didn't give him any meds at all for a week and he was running and romping in the yard with his sister showing no signs of any pain at all. I really thought he had been misdiagnosed and called the vet back to talk about it. She had another radiologist look at the original x-rays and he said that Indy had bone cancer - no doubt about it. They could not explain why his limp went away, but they told me to not be surprised if it returned.

Another month went by and they were right. The limp returned. I took Indy in for another x-ray. Comparing the first x-rays to the ones taken that day, there was no doubt that he had cancer.

At that point, we added tramadol to the Rimadyl since it was not enough by itself to make Indy more comfortable. Indy was diagnosed with mild DCM on May 30, 2010. He was completely asymptomatic for the disease and was not on any medication for it, but because he had that issue and was over 9 1/2 years old, I was thinking a more aggressive course of treatment would not be a good idea in this case. The vet said that the position of the tumor would make it very hard to get clean margins if I did opt to amputate his leg. Weighing all these factors, I decided the best course was to treat the pain and keep him happy for as long as possible.

The vet and I discussed the possibilities for him breaking the leg or other circumstances that I might be faced with. So with the plans of how I would handle these potential events, I took Indy home to enjoy the time he had left.

Indy handled this pain remarkably well. This is a dog that cried like I was beating him with a stick when getting his nails done. He was a nervous wreck at dog shows and although he was quite finishable, I quit showing him because he hated it so much. He was a total baby in situations other dogs handle easily. It was very surprising that he endured this pain so incredibly well. He never wimpered or whined during this entire time. He carried himself through this with incredible strength and dignity. When he got to the point where he would not use the leg and avoided getting up at all, I knew it was time to let him go with the strength and dignity he deserved.

Other than these recent health events, Indy only had one other illness in his life. When he was about 5 or 6, he developed a stone in his bladder and it blocked his urethra. He had surgery to remove it and it never reoccurred.

The picture above was taken a couple of months past Indy's 9th birthday. Indy passed gently laying on a beautiful lawn in the sunshine with the two people who were with him when he was born. It was a great honor to share his life.