Biopsy Update on our Furry Girl

Praise the Lord, the biopsy on Cassidy's tumor was...not cancerous. She is recovering well but has been sportin' the cone once again due to some scratching. It's been quite sad (albeit humorous) watching her scrape her cone on the walls, catch it on everything, get stuck in small spaces, etc. but it will help her heal faster so it's for the best. We figure she MUST be feeling better because she's starting to "counter surf" again looking for food. Ahhhh, labs, they live and die by their stomachs! Gotta love 'em! :) Thanks for your prayers and concern.

Update on Cassidy

Well Cassidy is home and recovering nicely from her "tumor" removal surgery. We won't have the biopsy results for several more days to know whether it is malignant or not but she is feeling much better. She really hasn't been bothering with her sutures so we're not making her wear her elizabethan collar but we did put it on her for a few hours after she got home to be sure she wouldn't tear the stitches out. She cried and whined so much that we took it off and have just kept an eye on her. Steve did manage to snap a couple of pictures of her though...for the ol' scrapbook. :)

A Little Excitement With Our Furry "Child"

Friday evening, as we put Judah down for the night, we noticed that our yellow lab, Cassidy, was panting a lot and her stomach looked really bloated. Over the next couple of hours I kept a close eye on her and began to worry that it was something a bit more serious than a little "gas problem." I got online to read about bloating in dogs and quickly found out that bloat in dogs is pretty much lethal unless caught early enough. Basically, the stomach twists and blocks the entry and exit of food, water, gas, etc. So, after making a call to the emergency animal hospital, we loaded Cassidy into the Jeep and headed across the Mississippi to the vet. After a quick exam and some x-rays the vet came out to tell us that Cassidy had what they call "food bloat." Thankfully, food bloat is not lethal, just really uncomfortable. The x-rays showed us that Cassidy's stomach was 4-5 times its normal size due to an enormous amount of food! I guess she must have been feeling like most of us feel after Thanksgiving dinner! :) The vet gave Cassidy some medication that caused her to "expel" the contents of her stomach so that she would at least be more comfortable. We left the vet scratching our heads and wondering how in the world she could have ingested so much food since we give her controlled portions. After returning home to my parents house, Steve remembered that Cassidy had accidentally gotten left in the garage for a few minutes...where her tub of food is located. Suddenly, we had our answer. She had somehow managed to pop the lid of her food tub open and ate and ate and ate...
She probably would have kept eating if the tub had not been nearly empty when she began. Thank God for small miracles! Cassidy is doing fine but is scheduled for surgery tomorrow morning to remove a rapidly-growing growth on her face. I know she's "just a dog" but please pray that the growth would be benign and/or not have spread if it is malignant. Thanks for your prayers!

Giving God the Glory

As most of you know, we've been trying to get our Bloomington, IN house on the market for a couple of months now. However, as in most things in life, God's timing and plan was different than my own. Once our realtor got our house on the market (it is rented to IU students and we listed it as a residential investment property), it sold in less than a week! In this housing market, I truly believe that God's hand was involved in the quick sale of our house. The investor wanted a quick sale too so I'm sure we'll be closing on it in the next couple of weeks. God is so faithful!

Videos...As Promised

Okay, here are a couple of videos for you. The first was actually shot before we left Reno (notice the scraped up nose from his wipeout at Emerald Bay that I mentioned in a previous post). Judah has begun to take up singing a bit so I captured a little ditty on film for your viewing pleasure. The second video is of Steve, Judah and Judah's cousins riding big wheels around my parents' deck.

Judah and His Cousins

Here are a few pictures of Judah with some of his cousins during his first couple of weeks here in Illinois. He is having so much fun playing with them a couple of times each week. I've also included a photo of Judah and I on the train at the local zoo. Fun!