A Year Has Past......

Well November 19th was a year from when we first found the cancer and December 1st was a year from when we first started treating (his first surgery). He had a check up with his oncologist on December 2nd and I was excited about this, but nervous to! He continues to look great!! The Doctor agreed, healthy, eyes looked great, no problem with lymph nodes...so off to X-rays. When the doctor came out I could tell that it wasn't going to be all good news :-( Jack has one small, oval spot on his lung. The vet said that this isn't what normal metastasized melanoma looks like, which is usually many and round. But because he is on the melanoma vaccine they aren't sure whether this is the vaccine keeping it down to one or if this is something new with the lung. She said these are common but because dogs usually aren't getting periodic x-rays they aren't found until its to late. She said that this one is in the perfect spot to successfully treat if it is purely a "lung" issue. She wanted to wait 4 weeks to see what happens with it. So he goes back on 12/30 and we'll know more then. So not the news we hoped for but I know we need to keep the faith and know that we have to cherish the fact that he is with us over a year later and continue to cherish each day with him!



I also spoke to his holistic vet and he has an appointment with her on 12/7 to see what our next course of action is there. I'll post more at the end of the month and hopefully the news is positive!!

Another Milestone!!

Well Jack had his 3 month check up today. His lymph nodes feel fine and his x-ray was clean!! So we will keep with what we have been doing and his next check up will be in December, where he will also get his 6 month Melanoma booster.

I asked the oncologist when I could breathe a little easier and she said a year after treatment started. I asked if that meant surgery, she said yes. So the first surgery was 12/1/09 and his second was 12/8/09. So we will have a party on 12/1/10!!!

Another Milestone!

Well we reached another milestone today. I took Jack in for his 6 month Melanoma Vaccine Booster and they went ahead and did his xrays today. Its been almost 4 months since his last xray. It came back normal!!! His lympth nodes are also normal. So he doesn't have to go back to the oncologist for 3 months (September) for another xray and then in December I'm assuming they will do more xrays and another booster!! He continues to look great!

Next step in our journey....holistic medicine

Jack and I had an appt with our holistic vet last week. He continues to do great and were are moving on from traditional medicine to supplement with holistic medicine. She now has me feeding him 50% canned and 50% kibble. With that he has a number of items that we mix in

• Multi Vitamin Daily
• Probiotic GI capsule daily
• Liver GI Detox Daily
• Myco Forte twice a day
• Dr. Goodpet digestive enzymes twice a day
• Salmon oil twice a day
• Modified Si Miao San twice a day
• Greens mixed with food twice a day (kale, dandelion greens, etc)

We will be going back to see the vet in a month. Each month brings new items to his care....but its worth it, he's doing great!!! So in May we just have a month check up with the holistic vet. Then his melanoma vaccine booster in June. I did check with both the holistic vet and oncologist about whether he should get his annual vaccines as I read you should proceed carefully after a cancer diagnosis. I haven't heard back from the oncologist yet but the holistic vet said to wait until he reaches his year being free of cancer and then do a blood test to see if he has the antibodies, if he does then we don't need to worry about the vaccine!

Yeah!!! He graduated from Chemo

Well today was Jack's last day of chemo, he continues to do great! The staff has been wonderful and they love him. They gave me a nice card with some nice notes in it along with a picture of Jack in a graduation cap...so cute! So after his CBC check next week he won't have to go back until June for a melanoma vaccine booster and then in July for a x-ray check. I will be checking in with the holistic vet in a couple weeks to see what more I can do on that end. Will report more once we see her.

Jack is doing great......

Jack has been doing great!! He has a wonderful appetite, good energy and no other problems. He had his last dose of carboplatin on Thursday. In two weeks he will be done with chemo, yeah!! So far no recurrence can be seen of the disease and we hope he stays that way!!

Latest Updates

Well I haven't updated for a while, been quite busy with soccer and work! Everything is going great with Jack. He has had two more doses of chemo, the last one yesterday. This is the one that can really bring his counts low so we'll keep a close watch on him! We did discover that when he goes to the vet he raises his temp almost 2 degrees!! His appetite is doing great and he has been full of energy and in a great mood. All tests/exams look good and his x-rays show no new disease, its been almost 4 months since we discovered the cancer in his nail. We thought yesterdays treatment was the last one but his doctor wants to do two more treatments. She said he has been handling it so well that this would be best. I'm getting a second opinion just to make sure. It is getting a bit costly to say the least! We did discover that he doesn't like the new Orijen fish blend that I put him on. So we are trying the regular one and also have him on Taste of the Wild. For awhile he was very picky and would only eat if it was something new each feeding. He has seemed to have gotten over that, for now! :-) I've stopped with the homemade wet food, and have instead been using good grade wet food as he didn't like the homemade food anymore. So for now all is going great, he is a happy guy :-).