RIP Boston

We brought Boston into our vet on Friday. At that point he was no longer eating, very stiff, and appeared to be in a lot of pain. We brought him in earlier in the week feeling he had hurt his back, but it was now becoming clear that wasn't what was going on. Our Vet admitted him. Over the next few hours - through Saturday, she did a chest x-ray and several tests - including the liver test, urine and any other rare disease. The x-rays showed fluid on his right shoulder and center chest, but his heart, lungs, spine, hips etc were all clear. So we were going with the idea that he was stung or bitten by a spider. She started anti-biotics.

On Sunday he was more swollen. She decided to start him on prednisone as well. He still wouldn't eat so he was also on a IV bag.

Yesterday morning he started coughing. We decided to do an ultra sound. It didn't show any masses anywhere, but did show some small areas of fluid in his lungs. He was laying down for a few days, unable to get up.

We started leaning towards the Lymhederma diagnosis. We decided to try to bathe him and he started bleeding from his nose. We were then rushed to a 24 hr Emergency hospital in Torrance.

Upon arrival, he was tested for clotting - which came back positive and took another chest x-ray. This chest x-ray showed massive fluid in his chest and he was obliviously struggling. At this point his nose is bleeding and he is coughing blood. They put him on oxygen and did their best to stabilize him over night with pain meds and fluids. Leaving him last night was not easy. We knew he would be touch and go all night. Around 1 am his heart rate went from being very high to very low where it finally stopped at 1:30am. They did attempt CPR, but it was unsuccessful.

Brent and I are obliviously trying to make sense of all this. He went from being a completely normal, healthy dog to one struggling to walk and then losing him in a few days. Nothing makes sense. I am doing my best to focus on the good times we had, the new life we tried to create for him and the fact that he is no longer in pain. Whenever someone (human or animal) leaves this world, we struggle for the whys and that is where we are right now. We are trying to make his life worth something but not allowing this to happen to another dog - and that means finding out how he died.

Below is one of my favorite moments with him, his first trip to dog beach. He wasn't sure how to get catch the tennis balls without fully submerging his face in the sand. Boston is one of those dogs we will compare all dogs too - forever in our hearts.