Buck came to us from a pet store in a mall.  We were looking for a drug dog and we sure found one.  He is a golden.  He has outlived several other K9 family members.  Last year, we took him to the vet's to have some growths removed, routine, right?  Wrong.  During the anesthesia part, his heart rate zoomed to over 220 and he started turning blue.  The vet, Dr. Hudyncia, gallantly saved his life and she didn't do the surgery.  The growth was inside his anus, but she aspirated it instead of surgery. We took  him to Colonial Vet clinic in Ithaca, NY, on her recommendation for more tests.  He has to wear a Holter monitor for two days to check his heart rate and in the meantime, we found out the growth wasn't cancerous.  He has another growth that wasn't cancerous, but was growing.  Colonial is a fabulous clinic and has specialists galore.  Dr. Gelzer is a cardiologist and she said that Buck could handle the surgery she thought and she would be there to monitor his heart during the surgery to remove the growths.  We decided that since they weren't cancerous, we wouldn't put him through surgery again and take a chance on losing him.  This was last summer.  We danced through the rest of the summer and into the fall and Buck developed a limp on his left front leg.  Now is a good time to tell you that his was 15 1/2 years old at that point in time.  We thought he had arthritis and gave him aspirin to ease his pain.  I, quite by accident, felt his leg and discovered that the leg was hard and swollen.  Off to Towanda Creek Vet and xrays revealed he had osteosarcoma.  Dr. Barry cried with me and gave me a hug.  She also said it hadn't gotten to the lungs yet.  Off we go to Colonial again as they have a oncology department and Dr. Barry said the doctor there was great.  We see Dr. Ross, the surgeon, and Dr. Gelzer again and they assure us that Buck can handle the surgery for amputation.  He can do the surgery that day!  We are not prepared for that, but give the ok.  To say we were nervous is an understatement.  It was more like being sick to one's stomach.  He came though it and was in hospital for several days.  Most people think we are nuts for spending so much money on such an old dog, but he isn't old mentally and the rest of his body is healthy.  It did take a long time to get him on in tripaws, and we do need some steroids to get him there, but he does it.  We live in a motorhome for the time being and built a ramp for him.  He doesn't use it, but for a while I (Nancy) would put him in a sling and slide him down the ramp and back up.  Getting up the last two steps was a killer, but in a stoke of genius, I thought of using a large toboggan to slide him up and down and it works just great!  I bought extra and now he gets in and out by himself and seems to enjoy the ride.  But I digress.  After the amputation, we met Dr. Rassnick, the oncologist.  What a fabulous man.  He took over the chemo part of Buck's treatment.  It consisted of injections every three weeks for four sessions.  Buck would be fine for first two weeks but then his white count would drop and we had to worry about infections.  Well, he got one and ended up in the hospital again for another week.  Dr. Rassnick saved his life and had to adjust his chemo.  After he got done with the injections, Dr. Rassnick said we need to continue with oral chemo to make sure we snuff out any stray cancer cells.  He takes Palladia, Paraxicam and Chlorambicil, along with sucralfate, prilosec and pepcid to coat his stomach.  So far, he is handling it well.  He will be 16 in June and is truly a miracle dog.  We have spent well over 14,000 dollars on him and I am sure there are others out there that have done the same thing to save the lives of their family members.  I think he is one for the record books.  I will have some photos posted as soon as I figure out how to do it.  Every day is a gift with him now and he still fetches the ball if we throw it.