It's been a rough two weeks ... and I find myself here because you all are the best humans I know at giving hope when you're feeling like the desperate crazy owner and need hope to cling to. 

Two weeks ago Grover had surgery for his intestinal mass. I (foolishly) thought that after an amputation an abdominal surgery would not be that big of a deal. I was so wrong and would do anything to take it back - but here we are. I underestimated the effect his normal analgesia plan for OA had and of course surgery disrupted it. No NSAIDs with intestinal surgery in dogs and with post-op complications he was NPO for several days which ruined his steady levels/state for the gabapentin and amantadine. The good news (I guess) is that the intestinal tumor came back as a GIST with low mitotic index and clean margins - surgery should be curative. They also removed his spleen because he had two nodules which were benign and he had a gastrotomy because they found a few foreign bodies in his stomach (naughty puppy) while they were in there.

Post operatively he had ileus, acute kidney injury and an incisional abscess. He spent about a week in the hospital (with an awesome team that I am so thankful for) but recovery is slow and I'm starting to fear that I stole his quality of life from him in pursuit of more time. How selfish of me.  I think recovery from the amputation was easier for him (but maybe time has eased that memory? lol). We were just finally cleared to re-start his NSAID and he has had the gabapentin and amantadine on board for a week now but he cannot get up on his own anymore and going outside to go to the bathroom takes a lot out of him. We finally have his appetite back and his incisional infection is headed in the right direction - but it prevents us from being able to do much rehab. I'm just really hoping that adding his NSAID back helps and we can get back to rehab soon... and that the inevitable OSA mets can stay away for a little longer so that this isn't how we spend the rest of his time. 

We have a recheck appointment tomorrow and I know that his whole team is pulling for him and we are in good hands. I just wish ... things were different and I could go back and make different decisions. Silly hind sight. 

Appreciate the time that everyone has - this has been a hard reminder how quickly things can change. 

Thank you everyone for your kind, supportive and helpful words. the week started out much better! The NSAIDs really, really helped and by Tuesday although he couldn't get up completely on his own yet he could get from lateral to sternal to sitting, up with a small boost and then was hoping like a champ. Tuesday they re-closed his incision because it was healing great under very light sedation. Unfortunately, for reasons we don't under stand after wards he now has paraparesis in both hind legs, is non-ambulatory and is re-hospitalized.

We have a great team and they have been very honest with me all along the way and they say it's not time to give up and that they still think we can get him back to his baseline or normal with time, anti-inflammatories and PT. It's not clear what happened - if somehow he slipped a disc or had a stroke/clot to his spinal cord or ... who knows. At this point they are hesitant to do further imaging (CT, MRI) because no one wants to re-anesthetize him or even sedate him and honestly, I don't think that I could put him through spinal cord decompression surgery even if we found a bad disc. That being said, he still has sensation to his legs and if you can prop him up he can hold his own weight ... he just falls over anytime he tries to take a step so the surgeons said even if it was a bad disc they wouldn't recommend surgery at this time. 

I wish the poor guy could just get a break. Of course, being a Great Dane, it's no small feat to have a dog his size who can't use his hind end. Two steps forward .. not sure how many steps backwards.