Our Dixxy Blu is one tough chick. If she were a person, she’d be on a Harley, belly poking out, not giving a damn about what anyone thought. She’s also got a heart of gold. Dix came to us with a grocery list of health problems and her grown daughter in tow. She’s battled wretched dental disease from years of neglect. Ovarian cancer tried to bring her down. The daily battle is with her every joint riddled by debilitating arthritis. Well, it’d be debilitating for anyone else. Not our Doodle Bug! (One of her many nicknames.)
Dixxy is the blue cattledog in my arms. Red Joolz is her daughter.
These gals have only been with us two and a half years but my heart sure feels like they’ve been here forever. There will never be two better dogs. The philosophy in the Prince household is to give old and sick dogs a loving death. We’ve been part of life’s transition more times than I want to remember. But, Dixxy’s not ready to throw in the towel just yet.
She’s had a tumor on her eye for a long time. The doctor’s have noted it and we’ve made sure to monitor it for pain. Dixxy’s never been phased by it. She’s never even rubbed at her eye. In the past few months it’s grown noticeably larger. She still pays it no mind.
It’s attached to the cornea, not outside on her skin.
Recently it began seeping blood. Not a big amount and still nothing that visibly bothered her. We consulted with our veterinarian and the only real option was to remove her eye. Removing only the tumor wouldn’t be a great result. In all likelihood it would quickly grow back. We’ve had dogs with one eye and even a dog with no eyes. They did wonderfully and our vet is an excellent surgeon. Scottie and I had been discussing the pros and cons of doing the surgery on our elderly gal. We were leaning towards not doing it. Dixxy took the situation into her own paws.
Dixxy in all her lovely glory shortly before the incident.
A few hours after this picture was taken, Scottie came home to find our girl like this.
Yes, it was heart stopping!
The immediate fear was her eyeball had ruptured. It had not. The tumor did. The amount of blood to come from this thing was mind boggling. I think we used 3 rolls of wet paper towels cleaning her. It kept seeping for a while but was less and less. True to her nature, she never showed fear or pain or mistrust.
There’s a small pulp remaining of the tumor.
As you can see, her eyeball is fine. Thank God! There’s still a small bit of tumor remaining on the cornea but the seeping blood is just about non-existent. She’s doing her usual Doodle Bug stuff… chewing on bones, thugging the other cattledogs, eating the tree roots and being bothered by her tiny boyfriend.
Gus loves Dix, we’re not so sure if she loves him.
Dixxy’s gonna be around for a while still. She will tell us. It’ll take a lot more than some bloody eyeball to get this girl down!
Dixxy Blu – Biker Chick Extraordinaire
cassidyapril.com 