My Olden Retriever

He is doing well.

He turned 13 at the end of July. Anyone who has ever had a Golden knows - they are just the best, most special animals. Duke has had a bit of a rough time this year. Around late March he started having days where he obviously didn't feel well at all; he was very lethargic and was just not himself. Multiple trips to the vet and he would seem to get better for a while. We spend a lot of time at our beach place during the Summer and he started having issues with his left eye. It was kinda gooky, for lack of a better, more technical explanation. We thought it was beach allergies and the vet gave us some drops which seemed to clear it up but then, a couple weeks later, the cycle would start again. He would occasionally have a day where it was obvious he wasn't feeling well but he seemed to be doing pretty well for an old man. Over the course of the summer he started to not eat. We didn't know if he was playing us or if he didn't like his food but it just wasn't like him. Over the Labor Day holiday, we were at the beach again and noticed his eye was not looking good. The drops were being administered but to no avail. Then, last Saturday he had another one of his bad days, it really worried me so I got him an appt with our vet again. He was back feeling better on Sunday but we were still off to the vet on Monday. Our vet took one look at him and recommended us to a veterinary opthamologist. I thought he was kidding; didn't know such a vet existed. Evidently they are not very common but lucky for us, he was about 2 minutes from our house. We scheduled an appt for Tuesday, the next day. The diagnosis was that Duke had glaucoma in this eye. My understanding is that it is from a tumor that forms in the eye and is extremely painful. Sort of like having a migraine headache all the time. His pressure in that eye was 60 where the other eye was around 12. So today he had his left eye removed. He was blind in it by now so it isn't going to affect his sight. We are having a biopsy on the eye to make sure the cancer was only in the eye. His prognosis is good. It all started to make sense to us about him not wanting to eat. It had to be very painful for him. He also slept a lot which is what I would do if my head was splitting open. It's incredible how these creatures communicate to us. They give us signs; we just have to be observant enough to understand them. Much like life in general! Here he is with his cone on, which he needs to wear for the next ten days so he doesn't tear out his sutures. He looks like he's been in a bar fight!

In honor of his bravely enduring his surgery, I toast him with this tonight.


Goldens are the best!