RIP Onyx
In the fall of 2003 a friend called to tell us about a dog in need. Our friend explained that there was a dog in a shelter that desperately needed a home. The dog was a female black Lab mix, and since we had just lost a black Lab to cancer a year or so earlier, we considered adopting her. When we heard Onyx’s story, we picked her up the same day.
Onyx lived in a house with someone who abused her and two pit bulls that often fought with her. She had been in the shelter for almost a month and since it was a kill shelter, she was scheduled to be put to sleep within days.
When we first met Onyx she had scars on her legs, face and body from the various fights and she was very nervous. Thankfully it didn’t take her long to fit in at our house. After a short time, she really started to open up and become very friendly.
After a couple of years living with us and our two other Labs, we noticed Onyx was favoring her left front leg when she walked. We made a trip to the vet and after a set of x-rays everything looked fine, so we assumed it was only a sprain. A few days later she was lying on the floor not moving and her stomach was swollen. We raced her to the emergency room where we learned that she had bloat. They operated immediately – turning her stomach back – saving her life. During the operation, they found something unexpected in her stomach – a red rubber ball. It was a small ball we had never seen before and the vet suggested it might have been in there for years.
A few days following her bloat surgery she was up and walking around. She went outside to go to the bathroom and ended up falling down in pain. We realized her leg was bothering her worse than we suspected. It had only been about a week since her first x-ray but we took her back to the vet for a second x-ray. The second x-ray clearly showed that her femur had doubled in thickness – it actually looked like a golf ball was bursting in her leg.
Onyx was diagnosed with bone cancer (Osteosarcoma). We didn’t know what this meant to her and after reading up on it and discussing it with our vet and a few referrals, it seemed that if we did nothing, she would be in intense pain and the bone in her leg could burst. We also learned that if we did nothing, her life expectancy would most likely only be a few months and chemo may or may not add a few months to that. Removing the leg was almost a necessity, but chemo was an uncertainty. We decided to go with the surgery only to relieve the pain, and opted against the chemo. We scheduled her surgery for the following day. It turns out, that she was operated on one week to the day from her surgery for bloat. Onyx had two major surgeries within 7 days.
After the surgery to remove her leg, she fully recovered within a week or so and quickly adapted to life on three legs. She was doing well and passed the three-month mark, but four months after her amputation, we noticed swelling on her shoulder joint. So back to the vet she went. The tumor had spread to her scapula and clavicle so we considered removing those as well.
Our vet sent us to a specialist at North-Star Veterinary Hospital in Clarksburg, NJ, for this surgery. The surgeon had concerns about the surgery though and didn’t want to do it. Her thought was that since the tumor reoccurred in the shoulder, it had most likely spread to her lungs and possibly other organs. They took several x-rays – and to our surprise – she had no signs of additional tumors. We decided to operate again and follow it up with chemotherapy this time.
They removed her scapula and clavicle and we met with their oncologist a week or two later and started her on a regimen of chemotherapy. The plan was to alternate her every month between two different chemotherapy types, Doxorubicin and Carboplatin.
That was seven months ago and she is doing great!
She has one treatment left in October and she hasn’t been sick once. She has not let the treatments slow her down at all. In addition to Onyx’s chemotherapy we also changed her and our other dogs’ diets, giving them natural/grain free foods. We also began giving them all supplements to help improve their immune systems.
As you can tell by her story, Onyx has been through a lot in her life, but she has a very strong will to live. We want to reward her love for us by giving her every chance to live as long as possible. Hopefully one day there will be a cure for cancer for dogs and humans. Until then, all we can do is continue the fight, give love and support, and live life.
-Patrick and Natalie Stano,
(Onyx’s parents)