Where Have I Been???

First of all we have have a crazy couple of months. Luke's mom has been in the hospital twice, including currently. She has has 3 emergency surgeries. We think she is finally doing better. My step-dad also had surgery on his hand and wrist.

Sculley was also in the hospital for a week. She was sick as a puppy and it ruined one kidney and made the other one operate a a faction of what it should. She has been on special food and filtered water for the last 6 years. But she has been fine. This summer we noticed her really slowing down. We thought it might be the heat. Or maybe she was depressed because I started working outside of the house and were gone more often. Then, one day, she started throwing up, and I mean everything. I took her to our vet, who has saved her life more than once. She didn't call me all day and then when I got there she wanted to see me. I knew something was horribly wrong. Sculley is in severe kidney failure. I had to rush her to the emergency vet, where she was able to get 24 hour care. They had her on a IV for 7 days trying to flush out her kidney. Then they told me there was nothing else they could do and we should take her home.

We are devastated. She looked fine, but we could tell how sick she was and it was obvious that the vets there had no hope. Her 'numbers' were higher (and still are) than most dogs who die of kidney failure.

Our vet recommend actions (we had already read about this on the internet as well). We now give her a few over the counter medicines everyday and (here's the kicker) we have to give her 500ml of IV fluid with a 10 gauge needle subcutaneously every other day. She looks like a camel for a few minutes and then it absorbs into her body. I can't bring myself to to it, so Luke has too. This is not a permanent fix, but she seems to be doing okay. It has been over a month. She eats, she takes short walks, she plays a bit. We will see.

I have cried more times at my new office then I have cried in years combined. I'm sure they think I am a basket case.

Other than all of that, things are going well. I am in the mists of planning Ike's birthday. And in a week or so we will have officially been parents for one whole year. Which means we did it! Whew! (hope you like the pictures. He will never look at me when I am trying to take one :)