Grade 2......

This past week has been a bit rough as we found out Speedy had a mast cell tumor (a common skin cancer in dogs) on his throat that needed to be removed surgically. The scary thought in the back of my mind was that he had this tumor for awhile, we just didn't know what it was. Our AZ Vet originally thought it was a skin infection and gave us creme. Never went away and we hadn't thought twice about it until he had some dental work done a few months ago and they wanted to send in a sample for testing. I guess I got confused with this new test alongside his dental work that I told Kerry to pass on it. What was I thinking? A part of me thinks I thought this additional test was related to his dental work. I honestly don't remember.

After meeting with the Vet last Tuesday night for a consult, we scheduled surgery for the following Thursday. All of this was done while Kerry was away in Mississippi. First hearing the news I was saddened. You never want to get a call like this. I immediately thought of Caleb and his "Seaby dog" and what great friends they have become. How I don't look forward to the day their friendship will just be a happy memory. All I could do was hope for the best.

The Vet explained the different grades of mast cell tumors:

A Grade 1 tumor is preferred having a benign behavior and excellent cure rate with surgery.

A Grade 2 tumor has moderately malignant behavior with a 20% chance of reoccurance.

A Grade 3 tumor is very malignant and only 10% of these patients are alive within 1 year.

I took Speedy back in today because his stitches were bleeding a bit and was given an antibiotic as it appeared an infection was starting. Lovely! I was also informed by the Vet that our results came back and Speedy has a Grade 2 Tumor. My one question to the Vet. "Is my dog dying?" His answer was peace to my heart. "No." The only problem with the Grade 2 tumor is the chance of reoccurance, that it had spread into some of his tissue. They removed a lot of the surrounding tissue if this was indeed the case, so hopefully we won't have any more tumors. We can only hope and pray that "Seaby dog" is around for many more years to come.

Thank you everyone for your thoughts and prayers as you all know how special Speedy is to us.