The Life & Times of Isis

It is with a heavy heart that I write this entry. After a long month of trying to figure out what was going on with Isis, we ended up having to put her down this afternoon.

After our wonderful day at the beach, she just wasn't the same. We thought that all the activity wiped her out, but when she didn't eat and moved very little the next day... we realized something was wrong. Our Vets were on vacation, so I took her to a different animal hospital and was told that she may have hip dysplasia and we were sent on our way with anti-inflammatories and a $290 estimate for sedation x-rays.

We didn't agree with the diagnosis and made an appointment a couple of days later with the fill-in vet. Both she and the vet tech agreed that she was showing signs of a tick-borne illness (E had pulled a tick off her that previous Sunday) and we were given pain medication and antibiotics. After 3 days with no sign of improvement, we saw our regular vet, who also agreed with the tick-borne illness diagnosis and he decided to increase the antibiotic dose to see what happened. Again, no noticeable improvement was seen. It was like a light switch was turned off and our puppy turned into a old dog... she no longer wanted to play or run.

Another call to the vet was made and we decided to do x-rays to see if there was something that had been missed. The diagnosis that came back was Panosteitis... which is inflammation of the long bones. Basically, growing pains for a dog. We switched pain medication and were told that we should see improvement in the next couple of weeks. The following week, she seemed to be doing better... she was learning to shake paws and was constantly wanting to shake. She even picked up a few toys to play with.

Then the past 3 days, she was steadily getting worse. She started whining and yelping when she would get up. The night before last, she was clearly in pain as her yelping increased during the night. Yesterday, I called the vet and got more pain medication since she spent the whole day being extremely uncomfortable. When I spent last night physically carrying her up and down the deck stairs, I decided to take her in today.

Needless to say, the news wasn't good. The thought is that there was neurological damage and we could have gotten a MRI or taken her to a specialist for a second opinion. The specialist is located in VA and I could not stand the thought of driving her a long way when the 10 minute drive to our vet had her in terrible pain.

I called E and we discussed it and decided that we needed to end her pain... which was a horrible decision to have to make. But I believe that we did indeed make the right one. The past few days have been so hard to watch her cry out and not be able to do anything for her.

She was loved by this family and will be sorely missed.

Cuddled up on the couch with her blanket to be more comfortable.

One of the last shots taken.

Maryland has not been good to us on the pet front. It is so hard to have to explain death to the kids. Our ever sweet and emotional e wanted to say this prayer...


'Jesus, please help my dog. Feed her, let her sleep and drink. Please take care of her and train her too. Amen.'