Kelsey

UPDATE 8-17-09 —

On July 4, 2009, I found a baseball sized lump on my sweet Kelsey’s tail. I took Kelsey to the vet that next Monday and she felt that it was a seroma and drained some fluid out of it.  She didn’t see any strange cells and we proceeded to hope for it to go away.  Not even a week later on the 10th of July, it was bigger and we tried to drain it again.  This time, nothing would come out.  We scheduled an operation to drain and insert a drain tube in this mass and headed in for the operation.  When Dr. Teter got in there, she noted that this was a tumor and she sent out a biopsy (which I opted to have sent next day air because I couldn’t stand waiting for the results…I had a bad feeling).

Tuesday the 14th, we got the call.  It was a malignant nerve sheath tumor. I stopped breathing.  I cried.  I was angry.  I was scared.  We decided a chest x-ray was needed to see if there were any other masses on the lungs. This came back negative.

I got an appointment with a local surgeon, Dr. Johnson for a consultation to see if she could remove the mass.  She felt that Colorado State was our best option.  We made the long 9 hour drive to Colorado on the 7th of August and saw Dr. Ramesh Sivacolundhu.  He performed the surgery and, while Kelsey lost his tail, we got the call this past Saturday that the cancer is GONE!

Now we’ll go to the doctors every three months for follow ups and every six months for chest x-rays for the next two years.  A small price to pay to have the kisses and love of my sweet boy.

Cancer is a battle, but it can be won in some cases and throughout this, I’ve learned that it’s an ugly disease and has no concerns for how we feel about it.  BUT, we won and Kelsey is my sweet survivor!

Cody, Omaha, Nebraska