Four months ago, Jazzmin was diagnosed with lymphoma.
Four months ago, we made the decision not to proceed with chemotherapy and decided to do steroids instead, figuring her odds of having good quality of life were better with steroids instead of chemo.
Every day after this, is a gift from God and a big fat middle finger aimed in the direction of Cancer. Jazz has had a wonderful life here with us and has been so loved throughout her life that we know she just wants to spend a little bit longer to give that love back to us. So, we’re going to treat every single one of these remaining days with her like the gift that they are.
As for today, I plan to take Jazzmin for her usual .4 mile walk. She will get a game of fetch with my daughter when she gets home and she will have many cookies and cheeses to beg for and, if the weather continues to look as beautiful as it does right now, we’ll go for a ride in my car and I’ll open the sun roof for her so her ears can flap in the breeze, one of her favorite things. We’ll just keep on doing these things until she doesn’t want to do them anymore, then we’ll know that she’s ready to go to the bridge ahead of us.
None of the things we have done in the last four months seems like the behavior of a dog that has terminal cancer. This is why it’s so important for pet parents to do monthly body checks and if you find anything new or unusual, ask your vet to take a look at it. It could be nothing, but in Jazzmin’s case, it was something and we have been able to give her more time and a wonderful quality of life for that remaining time, because we were able to take steps to keep her feeling good for as long as possible.
Don’t believe me? Take a look at some of the things we have done over the last four months. You would never know that she had cancer and honestly, this is why I encourage everyone to take ten minutes once a month to do a full body exam on their dogs, because you will never know if they have cancer through their behavior, until it’s too late.
[slickr-flickr type=”gallery” search=”sets” set=”72157632873004601″ captions=”off”]
