And how was your weekend?

Remember last March?, she was very sick, but she had a good prognosis. This time she was sicker and she has a scarier diagnosis and the prognosis is not good.

Friday night, I took Dogger out for her last pee of the evening. She was walking funny, like her legs were made of spaghetti. My first thought was Oh shit is is trying to throw up! Outside!outside!outside! . We got outside and she did not throw up. She fell down.

I couldn't get her up. I was out in my yard in my nightgown at 10:30 at night and my dog couldn't get up. I tried and tried and tried. I begged, I ordered, I dragged. Nothing. I'm out in the yard holding her head in my arms and I'm thinking that I'm going to have to call Broskey to help me move her.

And then she got up.

I spent the night sleeping on the floor in "her" room. At 9am, I called the vet who told me to come in now.

First I had to get there. There was a run happening. And not, I find out a useful run or a charity run but a Run for the Donuts. I am so glad I didn't know that at the time because I would have run people over. The run was blocking all the available routes to my vet. So, a trip that started at 9:22am and should have taken fifteen minutes, took me forty-five. And Dogger is in the back seat getting worse.

I told the vet about the spaghetti legs and she said it might have been a seizure, maybe Dogger had developed epilepsy. Then the tech took Dogger outside to get a UA and on the way Dogger repeated the spaghetti thing and the vet said it was not a seizure. The vet drew blood and checked her UA and the results weren't happy. Panic values for her BUN, CREA, CA and TP levels. Bad, badder, baddest. Dogger needed to be hospitalized right now.

And so she was.

The news there wasn't much better but they had a diagnosis. Dogger most likely had Addison's . She was not producing hormones that she needs to live. Essentially, her Adrenal gland is gone, she doesn't have one anymore.

The treatment is not cheap. The most effective treatment runs $200 a month. I don't have an extra $2400 a year, I absolutely can not do that, it's not possible. I started to think about euthanasia. I left Dogger at the hospital and went home and cried. I cried pretty much all day. I was absolutely prepared to take Dogger out of her misery no questions. But taking her out of mine was different.

So. All day Saturday Dogger is being treated at the vet hospital. She's getting better every time I call to check in. The healthier she got the worse I felt, I'm going to put down my healthy, bouncy, happy Dog. Because I can't afford to keep her that way. I am a terrible dog mommy. I am going to kill my dog.

At midnight they called me with her last test, she does in fact have Addison's. And I do have options. There are other treatments, one just came out with a new generic. another one is to do nothing. We did nothing last time and she was fine for a year, but she won't survive another crises, she is going to die, but I would much rather have a natural death for her than one I am the author of. The vet is doing a lot of research and calling pharmacies and other vets and she's working to find a way to help us. I joined a Canine Addison's yahoo group. I'm not crying as often.