The Start of Chemotherapy

Sunday, July 14th my husband, Wade felt a large mass on the side of Cloud's neck. It was about the size of a ping-pong ball so that is what urged us to take Cloud to see the vet the next morning. On the way there I was playing out in my head all the things that it could be. My main suspicion was an abscess. The thought of cancer never even crossed my mind. Especially since the mass had grown so big in what seemed like a short amount of time.
When our vet, Dr. Zahn examined him he gave us terrible news. It was a tumor and he suspected that there was another tumor in his stomach as well. Devastated, I could not even stay in the room to hear the rest of the information that was given to us.
Our vet set us up with an Oncologist, Nicola Wilson DVM on Wednesday July 17th.  I was initially extremely nervous about using this specialist. She had just graduated in 2012 and has only been at this animal hospital since July 1st. But I trusted my vet and decided to go with her.
Dr. Wilson examined Cloud and informed us that Cloud did indeed have a tumor on his neck, but he also had one further down his neck as well as one on his abdomen. She suspected Lymphoma and ran a blood test.
He was then diagnosed with large cell Lymphoma that day. Her advice was to start him on the chemotherapy pill, CeeNU, as well as a steroid, Prednisone to increase his appetite as well as put him in a better mood.
He will need to be rechecked every 3 weeks and a CBC will be given to insure that he is responding well to chemo and his white blood cell count does not drop drastically
So Thursday night we administered the CeeNU and Prednisone. I am assuming it has so do more with the steroid than the CeeNU but the very next day Cloud slowly started to return to his normal self. My husband laid him in bed with us and he slept there all night, when for the past 2 weeks he had insisted on sleeping under the bed or in the closet. Saturday he began jumping on the furniture again and his appetite has gone back to normal as this point, which is fairly large. He loves you look at you and give you that "Puss in Boots look" and sucker you into giving him extra treats. I even got him to play with his toy a little bit last night. It was a really great thing to see. I couldn't stand the though of his remaining time on earth being full of sadness and lethargy. I am hopeful that as we continue with treatment, he will become the super lovable, playful, cuddly baby I once knew. As for now we will just have to wait and see.  Please keep him in your thoughts.

igg.me/at/cloud-covarrubias

~Cloud's mommy,
Jessica

Cloud and his baby sister Roomba. Early 2009. Before glaucoma, uveitis, and cancer.