A Couple of Non-Productive Days

Last Sunday I mentioned I was looking forward to Tuesday and Thursday this week.  The reasons were:

1. On Tuesday, Carlos and planned on a day trip to the beach, with the pack.
2. Thursday it was Sasha’s 3rd chemo treatment.

We did go to the beach.  We headed to Topsail beach because there we dogs are allowed off-leash thru May 15th.  Our plans were to leave no later than 7 am, but unfortunately, we left much later than we wanted and ended up arriving at the beach around 1 pm.  The ride there was smooth; the dogs behaved really well in the car.  I was concerned Sasha would have a hard time with the car so full, but she was great, no struggle at all!  The pack seemed to know we had arrived; they were taking in all the smells from the ocean.  We had a car full of excited and happy dogs = )  We went straight to the south side of the beach, where is where we can they can go off leash. We parked and Carlos and I went to take a quick view to see how everything looked (few people, clear patch, etc).  It was an amazing view.  The sand was SO soft.  I was anxious and excited to see the fur-ones running around and swimming.

Unfortunately, there were a lot of people.  They were all spread out along the beach, as far out as we could see.  I immediately knew this trip would not work out.  It was OK though, we knew we might not be able to go on the beach with all six dogs.  We didn’t give up right then and there.  We drove to another area and it seemed very promising.  The ocean side had less people, a few had off-leashed dogs, which made us happy to see.  We saw where we could go, but unfortunately, it was a long walk.  Carlos and I and most of the dogs can do the walk, that’s not a problem, but Sasha cannot.  Walking 5 overly-excited dogs who would likely pull on us quite a bit and then walking with our tripwad Sasha, would be difficult.  Sasha can run much easier than she can walk.  When we take her on short walks, she makes quite a few stops before proceeding.  We have a harness to help her out, but it would still be difficult with so many dogs, not to mention we would have had to walk abut a mile to get to a nice uncrowded spot.  It was disappointing to say the least.  And even though the dogs don’t know what was going on, we felt really bad that the trip didn’t work out.  I really wanted all 5 of our dogs in the ocean to get a picture of all of them…it could be Sasha’s last trip, but I have faith that it will not be.

I had thought we could attempt going to the beach again on Monday the 14th, and we could leave a few dogs at our vet’s office, but we won’t be able to.  Hence we are planning on renting a house in October, once Chris picks up his baby girl Maddie.  Renting a house will be convenient because we can take all of them at the same time and also take turns by taking a 2-3 at a time.  Its so peaceful out and I’m looking forward to the fall.

Last Thursday, Sasha was scheduled to have her 3rd chemo treatment.  She has been doing so well after each treatment.  However, for this 3rd treatment, her white blood count was too low to proceed with the treatment.  If we went ahead, she could potentially get an infection, which would not be good.  Instead, the oncologist rescheduled her for this coming Tuesday, and she was sent home with antibiotics. At home she has been doing great and has not lost her appetite.  We have even started giving all of our dogs fish oil.  There are many benefits to giving our pets this beneficial supplement.  You can read information on it here.

I was excited for Thursday because it would be her 3rd and almost last treatment.  We can then get her re-checked to ensure her cancer has not spread.  Please cross your fingers that when we do re-check her, she is clear.   Sasha is a super girl = )

~ L.