Eomer's cancer.

With all the good stuff going on right now for us, we've also had a spell of worrying for Eomer. About 6 weeks ago we found growth inside Eomer's upper lip about the diameter of quarter and raised up about a 1/4". After antibiotics and anti-inflammatories didn't work, he had a pretty invasive biopsy with some bad news: a stage II cancer and mastocytoma (mast cell tumor).  Although these tumors are very common in dogs and are usually very treatable, they are normally skin tumors. Eomer's is in the soft tissue of the inside of his upper lip, so the prognosis is less certain. Luckily, we have Eomer with a good team of veterinarians at the Universidad de Chile and more importantly, they have a good treatment plan for our little guy! But the problem is the location: to remove the tumor, the surgeons have to remove at least a one inch margin of healthy tissue around the border of the tumor too. So at its current size, Eomer would need half of his face removed. Although that would certainly make him look more bad-ass and lend him some street cred, the doctors want to try to shrink the tumor first to reduce the total amount of tissue that eventually has to be removed. So After we got the good news last week from Eomer's abdominal ultrasound - no other tumors were found - we started him on weekly chemotherapy treatments.

As you can see, Eomer is such a trouper! He sits with an IV in his arm for about 10 minutes, and then we go home. I think the buzzing of his hair off his arm is the most traumatic part for him! After today, he's two transfusions down and three more to go, but the tumor is already getting smaller!  And he doesn't seem to be experiencing any side affects at all of the chemo drugs!  So here's the ironic part: if the tumor keeps shrinking, the surgery will be minor and basically give Eomer a cleft lip! I keep joking we'll have a matched set and we should look into 2 for 1 offers with plastic surgeons. Joan only half laughs at my little jokes though. :)  Anyhow, Eomer's prognosis is looking really great (he's super healthy otherwise, and still runs, jumps, and plays like normal). And Aunty Sue is mailing us some other highly specialized medicine from the US to follow up with after the removal surgery.  So if you get a chance, think nice, tumor-shrinking thoughts for Eomer!