For Dog Owners:

 We just lost April to cancer and while we have had other dogs that have passed away this time it was different. It was so sudden that we could hardly comprehend what was happening to her. 

 

The day before April died she was totally normal and we did not detect anything wrong with her.  She would jump up on the sofa and curl up next to me (two times) which was normal. She did her normal bouncing around at her three meals and acted in all ways normal. That night she started panting and we both got up with her until she calmed down and went back to sleep. The next morning she did not want to move and we took her right in as soon as they opened to the vet who decided that she had pancreatic carcinoma after many tests. 

She was totally weak, had a red blood cell count of one and her white cells were high indicating a major infection. She was bleeding internally. When they drew urine from her and brought her back to the room she leaked urine on the tile floor and it was so acidic that it totally bleached the color out of the tile. We had no choice but to let her go as there was no treatment that could save her and she was getting weaker by the minute. 

The point of this blog is that she went from normal in a matter of 11 hours to fatally sick. It was so fast that we could not comprehend what was happening to her and were still hopeful that she could be made normal again when we took her to the vet. She was not in pain but just got weaker and weaker very fast. 

We now have three depressed dogs and we are reeling from her sudden loss. We had no idea what was going on inside of her and she gave no clue. The lesson for us is to treat our dogs like every day is their last because we never know that it could be. 

We had April for just over two years and we feel confident that those were the best two years of her entire life. As painful as it was to lose her like this I would do it all over again and was happy to be a good doggy parent to her for two years. 

Her son Klaus, the one on the right in the photo, is now deeply depressed and we are hoping to pull him out of his funk sooner than later. It is a sad thing to witness. 

It is painful to lose them like April, suddenly but it is heartwarming to know that we gave her over two good years where she was loved and appreciated.