With all due respect there is way more THINKING going on on my side than feeling. If I didn't THINK about how the outcome of different surgical methods might make my dog FEEL I would not be acting like a responsible owner.
Yes I have GREAT advise from 3 very well taught oncologists and unfortunately I came here looking for someone who had a common experience but again I am having a similar experience to what I did 5 or 6 years ago when I joined knowing that my boxer at the time was going to have an incomplete excision of a grade 2 MCT at 9 years old.
I am grateful for groups like this when thoughtfulness is put into the posts like the post today thoughtfully comparing a private oncologist to UC Davis. This is very true to a point. If there is no study I don't believe the bias is there HOWEVER they have a protocol you must follow REGARDLESS and that leaves people like me who do think at their mercy rather than in charge of their dogs life.
I guess in some ways you may be right I am scared. I am worried I will make the wrong decision and my heart told me long before the third oncologist consult what I thought was right from my years of dealing with MCT's with my departed boxer. I just thought there may be something to learn here and was not looking for therapy for myself like someone assumed but more situational input for me to base my final decision on.
Thanks to all who have helped so far with thoughts and situations. It is all going into my decision making (aka THINKING). If you ask me the first sentence of this response to my post is misguided because there is NO WAY to know how a stoic animal is handling treatments because they really cannot tell us so unless you are an animal communicator and did not disclose it I do not believe we can venture into the world of assuming that because they handle what we give them with stoicism that they are having an easier time than humans do. To think that is really just not thinking - they are sentient beings with feelings as well.
I really wish people wouldn't assume so much about other people's posts. Maybe I should have also included my CD (curriculum dog) along with my post so it was known that I have 18 years of boxer experience, including co-founding a boxer rescue and running boxer email groups with thousands of boxers on it and that my "hobby" is canine nutrition and I came upon that "hobby" out of an illness that a boxer of mine years ago had and could not be diagnosed after much testing at UC Davis and private vets. I changed her diet and a month later she was nearly well. The nutrition change came from joining a list similar to this but for dog nutrition.
Just like everyone else here I was looking for thoughtful support and mostly information to base my decisions on. Doing this (posting to this list) is doing more than most people do.
Thanks again to all who share and offer support!
Jennifer
From: Stacy Jones <jolieve@polestar.org>
To: caninecancer@yahoogroups.com
Sent: Sat, July 24, 2010 2:47:40 PM
Subject: Re: [CanineCancer] Not an uncommon tale: 3 yr old Boxer with Mast Cell on tip of docked tail
Many people have a VERY misguided notion that treating cancer in dogs is the same as treating cancer in people and that's just flat out false. Dogs tolerate cancer treatments better than people do and have a better prognosis with cancer than most human beings.
Calm down and stop feeling this thing out. Start THINKING it out. From what I'm reading in your posts, you are upset and scared. That's NORMAL. Now take a deep breath and get through those feelings because it's time to knuckle down and get down to business and kick this in the backside.
Right now.. you don't have enough information to move forward.
You need to get this lump removed. You need to have it sent to a lab and graded.
For all you know right now, the thing is grade 1, which is NO BIG DEAL and may never reoccur. You will not know that until the lab work has been done.
My .02 cents.
Stacy and Lucy
Grade 3 MCT
Removed 5-26-10
Radiation begun 7-19-10
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