Walter In Denver

Miraculous

We've witnessed a bit of a miracle of science around here as of late. Here are the details.

In March of '02 we adopted a dog. We already had a dog, a Malamute. His name is Edgar, a beautiful thing that we found in a pound on the south side of town. He would be a show dog, except that he has some blue in the corner of one eye, and Malamutes are supposed to have brown eyes. We surmise that's the reason his original owner abandoned him.

But that was a decade ago, so that March we thought we'd look around for a younger dog to keep the Edgar active. We've grown partial to Malamutes, so the idea was we'd search area rescue kennels for a younger Mal to add to the household. Turns out that Mals are hard to find. I looked all over, and was about to give up when I found a lonely mixed breed Mal in a sububan municipal pound. She was scarcely recognizable as a Malamute, mixed with who-knows-what. But I was getting frustrated looking for Mals, and if the pound claimed she was a Mal that was enough to pique my interest. So I took her out of her cage and took her for a walk.

She was not a show dog. In spite of our plan to get a younger dog she seemed older than Edgar. Whatever her heritage was it had left her with some odd brown markings on her face, and she has a sort of Marilyn Manson look, one eye dark brown and one pale blue. She had one irresistable trait, though. She was uncommonly affectionate. Once I had scratched her ears she was hooked; she kept pushing her nose into my hand and insisting that I continue to pet her. I brought Mrs. Indenver out to see the dog and she named the dog Natasha and we all came home.

Natasha was in bad shape. She was overweight and it soon became apparent she had been cooped up in a small space. She took one look at our staircase and freaked out. It took a good ten minutes to coax her upstairs, and as soon as she made it to the second floor she peed on the carpet. Not a great start, but after a few days she got used to the stairs. After a few weeks of running around our yard she dropped the excess weight.

Adopting an older dog, we knew we'd have a limited time with her. So it wasn't a great surprise when a couple of months ago we noticed Natasha wasn't moving very well. She stumbled often, and was slow to get to her feet. She went into a rapid decline. Three weeks ago, I took her to the Vet. The prognosis was poor. She wasn't able to extend her legs, and it looked to be either severe arthritis, or worse, a neurological problem, perhaps a brain tumor. We put her on an arthritis medicine. She perked up a bit, but only for a day. After two weeks she was almost paralyzed. She wouldn't move, and I often had to carry her around. It looked like Natasha was at the end of her days.

I called the Vet. He recommended taking her to a neurologist. I hesitated. We're expecting a baby, money is tight, and the neurologist gets $175 just to see a dog. Any potential treatment would cost much more. What else could we do?

The vet suggested, without much hope, that we change arthritis medications and try a steroid based pill. Thursday I gave her the first dose. Friday she got up and walked around. Saturday she chased around the house like she hadn't in months.

Last night I took both dogs for a walk. Natasha ran ahead, dragging Edgar and me as she did her best to race through the neighborhood. She's more lively now than any time since we got her.

It's closest thing to a miracle I've ever seen.

Posted by Walter at January 27, 2004 08:47 PM