Rio came into our lives one cold February day. We had driven 36 hours to pick up this special little guy. Our son, then 16, started showing him with phenomenal success, even though Rio had 2 TPLO’s (Tibial Plateau Leveling Osteotomy).  Rio never hesitated to do what we asked of him and had a real zest for life. He was just a “fun” dog to be around.

By 2002, he had finished his main show career but we were planning on one last veteran’s class before we had him neutered because of prostatitis. I noticed a very small lump on his right front ankle and my heart sank. We immediately took our State Veterinary school and with a CT scan, osteosarcoma was diagnosed. We were devastated but our Rio was just as happy as ever. We were not ready to loose him yet.

Because of his size and past TPLO’s,  amputation was not an option and even if it was I don’t think we would have done it. The vets offered us an alternative which was removing the lower 1/3 of his ulna. Their  hope was that enough scar tissue would grow back to stabilize the ankle joint.  They had done this procedure once before and the dog survived for 18 months. I felt guilty about asking our boy to endure yet another surgical procedure but we just had to give him a chance.

The margins were clean with no sign of metastasis to other areas. It was a rough surgery on him but he was up and wanting to go for walks in a month.  The surgery was performed in June, 2002 and by that Fall he was playing and galloping around at will. Rio had amazing spirit. At the same time his prostatitis was getting worse but because of the poor prognosis we really didn’t want put him through yet another surgery. I made a decision to have him neutered if he was still alive and healthy in six months. He was neutered in December, 2002. His prostatitis improved but because of it he developed a new problem which evolved into diskospondylitis which was treated with antibiotics but never really cleared. He continued to have intermittent problems from the infection.

He was looking great on the 1^st anniversary of his diagnosis and surgery. I was giving him a belly rub when I felt a baseball sized lump in his abdomen and again I felt that old feeling of dread and disbelief. The vet confirmed he had hemangiosarcoma which probably was not related to the osteosarcoma. He felt because his immune system was so compromised that this tumor had a chance to grow. The prognosis was not good. Surgery was the option we could not take.  We were told he probable had one to two months. I researched Artemisinin (which is also known as wormwood and has been shown to be effective at fighting various cancers) and started him on 200 mg twice daily. Within a week the tumor had shrunk and by 2 weeks we could not find it.

The cancer stayed in remission for 3 months then started to grow again. September 4 he had a very bad night but was alert and able to eat. His stomach was hard and distended. His gums were pale and he had panted all night . The tumor probably had started bleeding  into his abdomen. He had lost the light in his eyes and I knew it was time. I didn’t want him to be in pain. He was able to jump into the car for his last ride after he had his last ice cream bar.  He passed over the bridge in the arms of his family September 5, 2003. He had beaten the odds. The darnedest thing was that the Osteosarcoma was still in remission.  He was 2-1/2 months shy of his 9^th birthday.  

Why did this happen to him?  We could blame it on genetics, bad food, bad everything or just bad luck. Whatever the reason, Rio is gone from our lives but he will  never be forgotten. We raised him. We loved him. We trained him. We showed him. We played with him. We had the ride of our lives behind him while he  pulled the Sacco cart. In return he gave us his heart. He never ever hesitated to give us his all. He took us on a journey we will never forget. The picture (above) was taken in October, 2002, five months after his cancer surgery.

We miss him terribly. We lost three Rottweilers and one old husky in 2003. All but the old back-yard bred husky were under 10. Old Beau was 13.