Duffy Cured?

Probably a year ago, our dog Duffy was diagnosed with nerve sheath cancer, which was showing up as a lump on the front of his neck. He's 10, and the doctor said he had probably a year to live, and that cancer treatments for dogs are just like cancer treatments for people -- just as painful, and just as expensive. We reluctantly decided to just let it go, and not run him (and our budget) through the suffering of trying to postpone the inevitable.

But when Daleen took him in for a checkup two weeks ago, the doctor was surprised to find that the tumor had grown out, and not in like they "always" do. And that meant that we might be able to just cut that thing out of there and be done with it.

Unfortunately, with Duffy it's not that simple, 'cuz he has a doggie equivalent of hemophilia. But they gave him some plasma to kick up his clotting, and cut the tumor out yesterday, and it seems to be pretty OK. When we picked him up yesterday evening, he was good and ready to get out of that scary place, but he seems perky and good. His neck's all shaved, of course, where it's supposed to be his big fluffy ruff, but it'll grow back.

We're not out of the woods yet, 'cuz there's a risk if internal bleeding (especially in Mr. Hemo Dog), so we'll have to keep an eye on him -- and keep the puppy away! But if that snagged all of the cancer, I guess he's "cured". We sure didn't expect *that*!