Hi There,

I'm so sorry you got this diagnosis because of a fracture. I would have been really traumatized by that myself, so it is no wonder you're feeling confused. 

It sounds like you have a good understanding of why we amputate---that we do it to relieve the pain, not cure the cancer. It is a tough decision to amputate, it seems so drastic. And the recovery period can be rough, with lots of ups and downs. But generally after 2-3 weeks the acute pain and discomfort of the surgery is gone and they just go back to being their old self. Most pups do really well on three legs. Things may be a bit slower but they can still pretty much do everything they did pre-amp. 

It is such a personal choice, and you know your dog better than anyone. But for us and our Ellie, the decision came down to whether we thought Ellie was done living. And she wasn't! We knew, like you, that we might only get a year. But a year in a dog's life is like a 70 yr old getting another 10. So we chose to take whatever time we could get. We don't regret it at all. She had almost 10 months of really good quality time. I wish it could have been more, sure. None of us ever gets as much time as we want. 

If you Samy is a "young-at-heart" 12 and the vet thinks she is a good candidate, it will probably surprise you how well she'll do after amputation. 

Denise, Bill and Angel Ellie.

So sorry you are here and having to make that decision.  As others have told you we know this will probably not cure our furfaces.  We based our decision on how full of life was our boy?  In spite of the pain of walking he still wanted to eat, get belly rubs and be happy in life.  So we proceeded with the amp to get him out of pain and did 4 treatments of chemo.  We had our amp on Sept 1st and Max is back to enjoying his life.  He doesn't do everything he used to do but does do most things.  He's a very long legged German Sheperd who has one speed which is fast.  Does he sometimes fall?  Yep but he gets right back up and keeps on with whatever he was doing.  We're hopeful we get much more time with him but if and when the mets come we are ready to deal with that too.  We've gotten ready by taking each today we've already gotten and lived it fully with him.  You know your dog the best.  Any decision you make based on love and conferring with the vet will be the right one.  We will support whatever decision you make.  We all know the place you're at right now and have been there ourselves.  We get it.  Please keep us posted.  Hugs!

Linda & Max

The first couple of weeks are the hardest.  What did Muji come home on for pain?  Murphy came home on Tramadol, Rimadyl & Gabapentin.  We made sure to give him his medications evenly spaced around the clock for good pain management .  The Gabapentin is great for nerve pain.  You can also apply an ice pack a couple times a day to the incision for about 10 minutes or so.  And massage around the area to help re-absorb the extra fluids.  Murphy took a little bit of time before he laid on the side with the incision, and we didn't crate him, we just mostly kept him contained in the family room.

As far as chemo goes, not everyone chooses to go with chemo.  A lot of people choose to do surgery and then that's it.  The type of chemo depends on the type of cancer.  Murphy had histiocytic sarcoma, so he had 6 doses of CCNU, which is a pill.  He got a dose every 3 weeks, with blood work done then and a CBC done a week after (at our regular vet since the oncologist is 1 1/2 hour drive away).  He might have had a little bit of nausea on the 1st day, but not much, hard to say, though, since he was also medicated at the vet and we had a long drive home, so it was probably just a combination of things.  Other than that, he didn't really have any side-effects from the chemo.

Donna