Sally I knew you would see it in his face! He was scared and anxious. I think one because he was as big as the tank and he's never liked being confined in small spaces. (Remember the kenneling problems at hospital when he came home with wounds & injuries). And second, Daddy says that tech was nervous around him like she was afraid of big dogs and he didn't like the energy there. I watched the videos again and there it is in the end of the first one, Atlas looks back at her with his very nervous face. I know we seem like the most difficult pawrents in the world, but I promise we are not, we've just learned to be better advocates for our dogs. Something about a death sentence like cancer makes you get straight to matter and no BSing around. We greet everything with an open mind and always bring positive energy to the table with everything we encounter in this journey called life. And there is something about this journey that has made us even more in tune with our fur kids then ever before and now we really pay attention to what Atlas is telling us. We know his happy face, his anxious face, his play face, his courious face, we know his I gotta poo face, we know his body language if he doesn't like someone and if he does. We know when he has energy and we know when he needs rest. I could go on forever..... The only thing we wish we could read better is when he's in pain. Like all dogs, its their nature to be stoic and boy is this big guy stoic!

This time it was Marc who made the decision. I knew he wasn't happy when he growled... Could you please stop pounding his neck, he has wobblers, remember. I don't know what it is about big dogs but everyone wants to pound on them instead stroking nicely when petting. We have that problem with friends and family too and every time we see Atlas wince when they start pounding, so we have gotten a little tired of telling people to stop pounding and pet nicely. The energy in that office was pretty dark and depressed and as we have come to experience many times along this OSA journey, the first thing the vet said right off the bat was a barrage of can'ts, don'ts and won'ts siting those horrible statistics. This is the first time that vet met us and there standing before him is an amazing dog breaking all those "rules" and not ONE single acknowledgement of what stood before him. I stopped him mid sentence, looked him directly in the eye and said please don't site all those outdated statistics to us, we have heard them a million times and we prefer not to live in that box and choose to be more positive and optimistic. He couldn't really keep eye contact with me (red flag). Anyway, we have learned on this journey that we will cross paths with all kinds of people and that's ok, our only focus is to keep going down OUR path with Atlas. So onward and upward, we are still searching for that deep PT pool where we can get in the water with him but until then we are going to visit a nearby lake and see how we do. Oh yeah, the vet also told me that Atlas wouldn't be able to swim even with the life vest......"hope you plan on having people in the water with him because he will not be able to swim. He will flip sideways and bob under the water without that front rudder." Personally, I just feel sorry for that man.