[nagdu] Kirby

[Tami Kinney]

Oh, I am so glad and may he not find out for a long, long time. Our
12-year-old 3-legged Daisy houond is starting to show signs of arthritis
in her back, so we've been discussing end of life planning for her.
We've known her remaining time with us would be limited, and given the
abuse she suffered, it's amazing she still is as fit and lively as a
pup. We're discussing pain management options for what seem to be
intermittent bouts of pain, and I continue to do what physical therapy
techniques I know to keep her body healthy and balanced. to keep the
back problems at bay. But we're agreed that the dog suffered enough in
the early years of her life and that when pain does become an issue for
her, it will be time to send her on to seek happy hunting and running
and climiing trees and, naturally, barking every step of the way, which
is what she most loves to do. /smile/ We certainly won't have a hard
time finding her should we get a chance to gather with her again on the
other side of the rainbow bridge. /smile/ Meanwhile, we can all
appreciate our time with our now (mostly) sweet, happy , loud hound and
spend our days cheerfully threatening severe bodily harm for barking so
loudly all the time. /smile/ It's a bittersweet sort of joy, but the
awareness that time is short does make the mooments we spend more
precious, as I'm sure they do for you and Kip. 

On Fri, 2011-07-15 at 16:46 -0400, Bernadetta Pracon wrote:
> Best,

> tami,
> Thank you so much for the kind words. Luckily, Kipp's canceris not 
> progressing quickly at all, so he'll hopefully be able to enjoy a 
> couple years of retirement in some measure of health and happiness. 
> Right now he's doing fine and is not actually aware that he is sick, 
> and I plan to keep it that way for him for as long as possible.
> 
> Bernadetta
>