Dr. DoLittle *Updated*

I need some input/opinions here. By Monday let's say. We have a 12 year old Husky/Shepherd/Something dog, Sasha. She is wonderful. Loving, patient, MELLOW, sweet, obedient, practically perfect. In the 6 years since we have had her she has fallen into a ditch, we took her to the vet and he found two masses on her belly that were huge tumors of breast cancer. We had them removed and she had 2 mastectomies. Since we have moved down here, she has gone deaf. I think it was were we had to board here while we waited for the house to close. It was so loud there.

Today I took her to the vet to get her shots and ask about a lump behind her ear. The doc lanced it~ it was so gross, but clear, not infected~ and while looking at her teeth he found another lump on her gums. He drained that as well and it was full of blood. He said that the one in her mouth concerns him because it could rot out her teeth and inhibit her eating. However the only way to remove it is to put her under for surgery. While under he wants to get the one off of her head as well.

She is very healthy. The only things that inhibit her are her back legs which are sore and she has to struggle a little to get up. She doesn't go for long walks. In fact, she has laid down on walks before and just given up. So we quit taking long walks. She seems very happy and not in any pain, except for her legs.

Here's my question, should we opt for the surgery? She could live quite a few more years, which would be fine. However, she just may stop walking all together, then were would we be? Her quality of life seems to be fine. I don't want to make it a money issue, but the surgery could cost up to $550. We have no idea how much longer she will live and the surgery will not directly prolong her life.

So, if you had a geriatric dog, who for the most part has a good life, and needs surgery to remove a mass from her mouth, do you do it?

* We are going to opt for the surgery. By the next day, the mass in her mouth was already filled with fluid/blood again. She is eating differently than usual and I just ant her to be comfortable. But I agree Flicka, I get attached too and as long as she is happy, I think we should do our best to make her comforable.

Peek a Boo

There's nothing like a healthy dose of fear to make you feel alive. Even better is when you find out the fear is completely unfounded. The U/S on Tuesday was wonderful. The baby started noticably moving over the weekend so I had started to relax a bit. The baby rolled while I was in class on Monday. You know the feeling that you get in your stomach when you crest the top of a ferris wheel and begin descending? That's what it felt like. Wonderful and a little nauseating at the same time.

On the U/S we saw that it's alive. Still a beating heart. It has a skeleton. Hands, feet, organs, loves to move. The placenta is high in the uterus so I don't need to worry about placenta previa this time. And we saw a little something extra. I guess E and I wanted to know what the baby is more than we let on with each other.

We are having a boy. Dani is excited beyond words. She is telling everyone that she is having a brother.

Postponed

Well, it wouldn't be a scheduled appointment day for me if SOMETHING didn't go awry. The radiology dept. called me this morning and the chick told me that her machine is down so she has to reschedule me. Until next Tuesday.

I really don't like having the control of my well being (mental) in the hands of other people. And what is frustrating is that it is my problem that I let it stress me out. I just really would like some confirmation that things are going well. My doc. didn't want me to go past 20 weeks without the ulstrasound because of my already spiking blood pressure and now we are going to be past that. 20 weeks hits tomorrow.

I wanted to start stockpiling diapers and wipes, and lotion, and get paint samples. I just can't do it yet without a wee bit more confidence.

I'm afraid. For no particular reason. Just afraid.

Bizzaro

I'm telling you. Pregnant dreams are the best because they are SO bizarre. This must be what hallucinating on drugs is like.

Last night I drempt that I was a surrogate mother for my mom and stepdad. Crazy enough, right? Well, it doesn't end there. A few weeks after transfer I got pregnant myself. So, I was carrying 2 babies, one 4 weeks older than the other. That was the most odd thing. Well, it gets to the point of the ultrasound and the tech asked if I wanted to know the sexes. I said, "Don't tell me, but I will look and if I see, then I see." Which is about what I plan anyway.

Well, I watch the screen and I see that the bigger one is a boy. Then the smaller one is a boy too. Then for some reason I go into labor. And I am in a military hospital, but an old one. There is literally a row of beds filled with women in various stages of labor. Before I get into a bed, I have my mom's baby. And in my dream I am feeling all of the contractions. But I'm trying to not scream because there are babies everywhere nursing and some moms sleeping, and I didn't want to disturb them.

So, they take my mom's baby, I don't know where, and start monitoring me for the second baby. Only my contractions are slowing down, getting further apart and aren't as painful. So the nurse tells me to walk around. As I walk, they stop completely, so I'm very confused. All I can think is that my body is just going to wait the next four weeks for this baby to be born.

Then I get the bright idea that, "Hey, I have E's phone with me. I should call someone." Because up to this point I was all alone. So, I start dialing E's phone and he just shows up wondering where I have been. I start crying and tell him I'm so glad to see him because I've been here all alone.

In my dream it was weird that he was there because we had gotten divorced and I had remarried. So, I don't think the second baby was his, but he was with me anyway.

Firepower

Where we live here in the panhandle of Florida, minutes from the sugar white sands of the Gulf Coast, there are 2 Air Force bases, a Navy base in Pensacola, and a few little bases that are referred to as 'fields'. I think basically they are a runway in the sand with a couple of buildings for personnel. The cities/towns in the area are all built around these bases and the range that the bases use for exercises, and practice bombing, and shooting their guns. Our neighborhood is probably about 10 miles from this range. Nightly we hear the booms and repeating fire from these exercises. Noise near an air base is not uncommon but we had usually only heard the planes themselves. Now, we rarely hear the planes, but we hear their firepower.

Several times a week as I am laying in bed listening to the booms and bangs, I can help but be thankful that for us, these are not scary. For mothers in other parts of the world like Iraq and Afghan. they must be terrifying. Oddly, it doesn't make me feel safer, I makes me sad and angry that hundreds of thousands of people in those countries do not get a restful sleep because they fear that sound of aircraft firepower.

And there isn't really anything they can do about it except worry that one night that bomb or gun may be aimed at their home.

Is that a Salami or.....?

I know its wrong. I can't help it. The new subway commercial advertising their "$5 Footlong" is hilarious. Is it the catchy tune? The odd characters? No. Its the fact that people are putting their hands up to represent a foot long and it looks oddly like a male mating dance. "Hey baby, check out my footlong."

Spring Broken

I am not ready for Spring Break to be over. I enjoyed having a week where I didn't have any homework to do. Although I did get started on a sculpture I am doing for Humanities. But it was fun so I don't really count it. Dani enjoyed her week off too. We didn't really do much. We are both a little overwhelmed with school I think. But there were a few days where she spent the whole day 'out' just moving from house to house playing. Heaven.

I go back today, and the kids still have today off. Tomorrow they go back and I'll get the day to myself. Except for the optom. appt. I have tomorrow afternoon.

So today I am going back to school. Reluctanly, but I only have 4 weeks of the sememster left. So there is that to look forward to.

Gah

I knew it just a matter of time after telling my mom that she would do something tacky. She sent me a lovely e-card congratulating us on the baby. Then writes this as the sentiment.

"We knew if you kept practicing you would get 'er done!!"

I don't want to be over sensitive, but really, she knows that I don't say things like that.

The Cat is Out of the Bag......

.... I hope it doesn't run out into traffic.

We made a formal announcement to our family and friends via email and a MySpace bulletin this weekend after we called our mothers. We finally confessed to our mothers what we have done. Actually, Dani told them. I still didn't want to be the one to tell my mom. I was wondering about that and E suggested maybe since I am finding out so many things that my mom failed to disclose to me that I feel justified in not sharing this with her. Makes sense to me. Thankfully, she didn't plan an immediate trip up here. I think we are safe from that until the summer.

Now, after telling everyone I wish that we hadn't. I liked having that knowledge between us and our CLOSEST friends and family. Now, I feel like we jumped the gun, and didn't wait long enough. Like now something is going to go wrong. I guess it would help if I knew if these feelings in my gut were and actual living baby, or just my nerves.

My ultrasound is scheduled for April 17th. I'm excited and dreading it. Everyone keeps asking if we are going to find out the sex. I don't want to. Now, if I happen to see something on the screen, then there really won't be any denying it. And of course I'll share it with E. But beyond that? I don't really want to share. Everyone keeps asking, "But how will we know what to buy?" Well, I haven't asked for any kind of shower, I haven't planned any theme for the nursery, and I haven't expressed a desire for either one. I fully understand that my friends are as excited and hopeful as me, but that kind of thing has always made me uncomfortable.

I started a T@rget registry for US. Meaning, it is intended as a way for me and my non-brain to keep track of what we need. I don't know yet whether I even want to share that with anyone.

Why it is easier for me to share this with people I have never met and feel completely fine with it, but talking to a friend about it makes me break into a cold sweat?

I must be allergic to the cat.