boxers4life2001
Boxer Insane
I am here once again asking for prayers and positive thoughts for my baby girl Maddie. She is my white (deaf) 6 1/2 years young boxer!!! The past few weeks I noticed Maddie just wasn't acting like her normal self. She wasn't as active or playful and seemed to tire out more easily. Looking into her eyes, I could tell she was not feeling well. She was still eating great, no vomiting or diarrhea or anything like that, she just wasn't herself (call it mothers intuition). I took to her work with me last tuesday with the hopes that I was just being paranoid and looking into things to much and the doctor would say she is fine, however, that is not the case. After running a full blood panel on her everything was normal except her glucose level, it was 41 which is very low. I checked it again two more times that day and it was still low (a little higher than before but still low). Since Maddie appeared to be hypoglycemic, the doctor suspected she might have insulinoma, a malignant tumor on her pancreas. We ran another blood test to specifically check for it and yesterday we received the results. I am devastated to say that it does indeed look like Maddie has insulinoma. Insulinoma is not that common in dogs (it is very common in ferrets and w/surgery they usually respond very well). Dogs on the other hand do not typically do well and the prognosis is pretty poor. You can try to treat medically with steroids and smaller, more frequent meals (to control the hypoglycemia) but they usually only live for 2-12 months if your lucky. Surgery is an option, as they can try to remove as much of the tumor as possible however it is not a cure and symptoms can return a few months after surgery. With surgery the survival time can be 12-16 months depending on how much it already metastasized at the time of surgery. The pancreas is a very "non forgiving" organ, it doesn't take much to make the pancreas angry. Just handling the pancreas can cause pancreatitis so to actually have to cut into the pancreas to remove a tumor on it can be pretty risky. After speaking to her doctor, her surgeon (my boss) and the internist they all feel like we should go ahead do an exploratory surgery on Maddie to see if the tumor is resectable and indeed the true problem. I have been sooooooo torn as to whether to go ahead with it or not. I have been teetering back and forth all day trying to come terms with everything and if we should even be risking her life right now. There are a few pros to go ahead with it but a lot of cons. Even with surgery, IF she does well afterwards her prognosis will still be guarded to poor. So many things can happen during and after surgery (the following 3-5 days post-op is very critical and still very touch and go). She HATES being at the hospital and is so scared it's sad. I feel bad she cannot hear my voice to tell her everything will be ok and that I love her. She will be so confused and scared it breaks my heart.....she won't understand why I am doing this to her. She will need to be hospitalized for several days if everything goes smooth and no big complications arise. I was dead set against doing the surgery in the beginning because the outcome is usually not that good and dogs don't do well with insulinoma BUT the one ray of hope I have and the reason we decided to go ahead with it is because of a boxer girl named Sasha. She was referred to our hospital a year ago for the same problem. Her parents decided to go ahead with the surgery and one year later she is doing really well. I keep thinking about her and hoping and praying Maddie will be just as fortunate. I am so torn, I pray we are doing the right thing. My biggest fear is she will not respond well right after surgery and we will lose her sooner than if we decided not to go ahead with it. Other than her being a little more layed back right now she is still so full of life and loving it, I pray I don't take that away from her. I wish there was a right decision to make but it doesn't seem like there is. Of course if everything goes right, she does well and we still have her with us 6-18 months from now then surgery was the right choice BUT if she doesn't do well and we lose sooner then I made the wrong choice. Maddie is scheduled for surgery tomorrow (thursday). It is a very serious and very risky surgery. I am soooooooo scared, sad, depressed, anxious, unsure, a mess, etc. I lost my boy Chance 2 years ago and I'm still struggling to come to terms with that, I cannot lose Maddie too. I've asked Chance to please watch over his sister and help pull her through this. I will be staying overnight at the hospital with her, sleeping right next to her in the cage!!!!
So please, if you can say some prayers for Maddie we will appreciate it more than words can express. Please pray that we are doing the right thing for our baby girl. We could us all the positive thoughts and prayers we can get. Thank you!!1
Carrie and Maddie
So please, if you can say some prayers for Maddie we will appreciate it more than words can express. Please pray that we are doing the right thing for our baby girl. We could us all the positive thoughts and prayers we can get. Thank you!!1
Carrie and Maddie
