What is that?!

This morning me and my precious girl went on a long walk. I was SO happy, like over the moon, giddy as a little girl on Christmas morning happy. I had just walked with who I knew would officially be "my dog" soon. I loved walking her. I loved watching her little ears bounce with each step. After we got home and cooled off for a bit, my hubby comes downstairs and asks me what that "bump" is on her neck. Bump? What bump? Why this one....

At first I didn't completely freak out, but then I realized it was her lymph node. I contacted the rescue to let them know,and see if the foster had noticed the "lump" before I got her and she had not. Apparently, this happened literally over night. On Sunday, another lymph node had swollen to the same size.

Hazel had a vet visit that following Monday. I was petrified. As soon as the vet saw Hazel, I saw "the look" cross over her face. "You know what my concern is, right?" She asked. "Lymphoma", I said. While there can be more than a few reasons for swollen lymph nodes, the fact that they had increased in size so quickly, and were filled with so.much.fluid made her think that it was cancer. She had never seen a case like this that wasn't. Cancer...the same disease I lost my best girl to, and my cat. We had just put down my 18 yr old cat the week before, and all I could think was that I had finally had my "dream dog" again, and now I was going to lose her too. Dr J took some fluid samples and immediately looked at the cells under a microscope..she paused, and then said that she is not seeing what she would be seeing if this was indeed cancer. It was looking like a really bad bacterial infection. We still had to wait for the tests to conclude this, in addition to testing for Valley and Tick fever, but that's what her guess was. Hazel was put on antibiotics. Still, her lymph nodes continued to swell. Two days later, they were so big that fluid/blood started leaking from them.

Our poor girl was miserable. Feeling helpless, I called into the vet and was told that it is definitely a bacterial infection, and now that we know we're not looking at cancer, we can start prednisone to help reduce the swelling. She had her first dose that Wednesday night.

By Friday, she was soooo much better!! Her lymph nodes were almost back to normal size. I got to walk her again Saturday morning, and she had her first outing to pick up some more food and treats.

Can I pay with kisses?

I am so thankful that she is on the mend. I sure wish we could figure out what caused this to happen. If we don't, there's a very good chance she could be exposed to whatever caused this again. For now, I am not going to worry about that and am soaking her up!