Last Friday, 24th March 2006, Henry was taken to the vet for an X-Ray on his right back leg. He is nearly 9 years old. Like a lot of other stories on this website, we just thought he'd hurt himself running around a few weeks previously. He had a slight limp that the vet thought would settle down after some anti-inflammatories.  After no success with the anti-inflammatories, we were advised to have it x-rayed to see if he had a problem with his cranial cruciate ligament, which apparently is quite common in Rotties.

The vet phoned me up on Friday afternoon and said she had 'bad news' and that the x-ray had shown her something she really didn't expect to see. A very large tumor, most probably osteosarcoma, had taken over half of his thighbone and it was liable to break at any time as the tumor had destroyed nearly the whole bone. She also said she couldn't understand why he was so happy, when other dogs would have shown a great deal more pain a lot earlier.

The options were, amputation, take him home or put him to sleep straight away. She advised us to take him home and make his life as pleasant as possible for the time being and just let him be himself. We can't put him through the pain of amputation or seeing if a specialist can rebuild his leg. That would be for out benefit, not Henry's. He doesn't know what's going to happen to him and it's almost certain the cancer has already spread elsewhere, though it's not showing on his chest x-ray yet. The vet gave us a strong painkiller to give him if his leg should suddenly break and then we can call a vet out to the house to let him go peacefully with his family around him. Henry's never happier than when all of us are together at home. He just can't stop smiling and wagging his whole body.

This weekend was the most upsetting and traumatic time we have ever known. Every time I looked at him, the tears would just run down my face uncontrollably. My husband just sat and stroked him for hours on end.  We thought Henry was a very special Rottweiler, with his funny personality and his silly grin whenever we have visitors but, reading other stories on this site, we know there's a great many Rotties like Henry out there. Every time we have visitors, even if he's never met them before, Henry always thinks they've come to see him. I'm sure he'd just let a burglar walk right in and take everything as long as he got a pat on the head. And, like another dog on this website, he loves to chase laser lights. You only have to point at the ground and he starts looking for a light to chase ~ quite bonkers. He also likes to pinch the apples off our apple trees in the summer and will carry one round with him for days before finally getting round to eating it. Then he goes out and takes another one and the process starts again until all the apples are gone. We hardly get to eat any of them.

I've read about Artemisinin on this website and I'm going to try that on Henry to see if it helps. I'll let you know how he gets on. I'm not really expecting any miracles but when you love an animal so much, you have to try all you can for your own sanity. I'm also being sent some remedies by my Homeopath to help prevent the spread of the cancer and ease the pain.