Baker Easter . . .

Funny. . .

You won't get the humor in this post unless you know our family really well so you might as well skip it if that isn't the case. . .

In the movie re-make of Cat-In-The-Hat, well behaved sister, Sally, begs her mom to give her rules, too, just like her brother.  After watching that movie a few years ago, I started handing out rules to Zach just so, you know, he wouldn't feel left out when Gloria got rules.  When I leave the house, I will tell him things like, "no drinking and smoking while I'm gone."  He usually just rolls his eyes at me and I'm the only one who finds the humor.  This morning I told him not to have any wild parties while I was away and he said, "What do you think I'm going to do, call Mike and say, 'my mom's not home, come on over and play Cattan'???"

HA! It made me laugh.  It made me count my blessings that I have an 18 year old boy who doesn't know how to get into trouble.  Maybe I should knock on wood but I think we've made it through the tough teenage years (with Zach, anyway) with very little duress.  (I actually thought the same thing when he made it through the "terrible twos" in much the same way but then he turned into a little monster bully for a year when he turned three. . . I hope history doesn't repeat itself. . . )

Update on Lucy. Sort Of. . .

I really wish I had an update on Lucy.

One of the most difficult parts of her illness is the not knowing.  One minute she is happy and seemingly full of life and the next minute her nose drips and she lays on the floor seemingly lifeless.  Obviously I prefer the former. . .

These drugs could have something to do with it.  In an effort to help her liver recover, these meds could actually be causing even more problems for her stomach and her esophagus and even her bone marrow.  They may or may not be helping her liver.

Each drug has to be given in a specific way at a specific time.  Some with food, some on an empty stomach, some an hour before eating, some squirted into her mouth with a syringe. . .

Some of it gets crushed and mixed in with her special dog food in a syringe that goes directly into her feeding tube. . .

We had a follow up visit this morning with the specialist who has been treating her and we really didn't learn anything we didn't already know.  They drew blood (again) and found that her "numbers" are slightly better.  As far as they can tell, she isn't bleeding internally.  For now.  She has lost a few pounds.  In this case, that's not a good thing. 

Just when we think she's doing better, her nose starts to drip. . .

I'm hyper aware that there is suffering and sorrow in this world and that our situation is probably just a drop in the bucket but being in this state of limbo just feels wrong.  I look at people's faces and I wonder what hard things they have to live with and somehow that helps me put things in perspective.  And I feel for the parents with high-needs children and adult children who are caring for their aging parents and anyone who has dealt with cancer and death and loss.

And Lucy is so good and so sweet and so obedient and faithful and it's so hard to see her struggle with all of this. . .

And just when it starts to feel hopeless, her nose stops dripping and she picks up her frisbee and wags her tail and we start to think that maybe, just maybe, she'll be ok . . .

Hiner Easter Afternoon. . .

Despite the roller coaster we've been on with Lucy, life continues to move forward.  I continue to take pictures and they continue to pile up in my picture folder.  Today Lucy seems to be just fine.  It's hard to get my hopes up though, because I did that before and it made it even harder.  We're just taking it one day at a time and enjoying the time we have with her right now. 

These pictures were taken Easter afternoon with my family in Nampa.  Rob stayed home from church and from the family party to be with Lucy.  He is usually the Great Egg Hider so it wasn't the same without him and I think the eggs were found a little more quickly . . .

It was a lovely afternoon. . .

Update. . .

Lucy is home from the hospital.  We made the difficult decision in the middle of the night to take her in because her belly looked like this in the morning:

 And like this in the evening:

This wouldn't necessarily be abnormal in a dog that just had surgery except that Lucy had bleeding problems before her surgery that could have been life threatening without a plasma transfusion.  The only reason they caught the bleeding was because a superficial cut on her nose wouldn't stop bleeding.  They decided to run a test to find out if her blood was clotting and that test gave them the news that she was bleeding internally and unable to clot normally.  So last night when we saw the bruising getting increasingly worse and her nose beginning to drip again we couldn't help but think the problem had returned.  Unfortunately, we were right.  Lucy spent the rest of the night and most of today at the hospital for observation and more plasma treatments.  Not only is her liver severely damaged but it is beginning to take other organs down with it in an effort to save itself.  We really just have this one chance to turn things around because it's either going to work and she'll get better or it's just not. 

In the meantime, she's happy to be home and she's alert and responsive. . .

The doctors and lab assistants fell in love with her sweet spirit and obedient attitude.  She seemed to know what they were doing and what was expected of her.  She knew which bed was hers and which room to go into for her tests.  They didn't need to leash her while she was in their care and she always had a tail wag for anyone who stopped to chat.

We are not giving up hope yet. . .

Broken. Record.

So. . . Lucy is back in the hospital.  She showed signs of having a bleeding problem last night- the bruising on her belly became much, much worse and the little cut on her nose began to drip.  She had such a good day that it was difficult to make the decision to take her in but, finally, at about 1:30 a.m. we made the trip back to the vet hospital to have them take a look at her.  They took a blood draw and confirmed that she is bleeding again but they don't know right now how bad it is but it does prove that her liver is not yet able to function the way it needs to.  Without racking up another huge bill, they are going to do what they can and observe her closely for at least today.  We are wating to hear from the specialist that has been treating her to see if there are any options left.  Hopefully we'll hear something soon. . .