Bone Cancer Dogs

Sampson's Page

Weight: 180
Breed: Saint Bernard
Age when diagnosed: 8

Tumors:

Osteosarcoma in the Front limb

On July 17, 1999, a big furry goof ball came into our lives.

We adopted Sampson from some friends of ours, and from then on, our lives were completely changed.

When our friends brought him out to us, I took one look at this big hairy, slobbery, one eyed dirty (yes, he was very dirty) dog, and I thought, oh my, what are we getting ourselves into. I actually did not like Sam when I first saw him. Within a minute or two, Sam proceeded to run up to me, knock me over, and cover me with slobbery kisses. I was hooked!!! And I fell in love, BIG TIME!!!!

Sampson settled into a routine of nightly walks around the yard with Al, visits to the neighbors, and "chats" with Dad every night in his dog house.

Sam actually became quite smitten with the neighbor's dog, a Pug named Doris Day. Doris could often be found having crawled in Sam's kennel and the two of them could be seen snuggling together in his dog house. Hard to imagine a Pug and a Saint Bernard huh!!!

Throughout Sam's time with us, he was hindered with different health issues. When we first got him, he tested positive for Heart Worm and sucessfully went through the proper treatments for that. He was continuaully bothered with hot spots also, and under went steriod treatments and continual treatments with anitibiotics.

In late July/early August of 2003, we noticed Sam limping and favoring his left leg.

August 11th, 2003, upon a visit to our vet, it was confirmed that Sam had bone cancer.

At that particular time, we chose not to do amputation, a decision I've come to regret.
Several issues led to that decision at the time.
Mostly, we were not really educated in this disease and the option available, and Sampson had athritic issues.

We opted for pain management. In mid November of that year, after much discussions, Al and I realized that maybe amputation was okay, because Sampson still had so much life in him despite the pain, that was still manageable. We made the decision to amputate right after Thanksgiving.

November 19th, 2003. We came home from work and found Sampson laying in his kennel, outside of his dog house, yelping, and pretty much "screaming" out in pain. His breathing was extremely labored, and he was very incoherent. Al and I looked at each other, and somehow, we both just knew that we were loosing our boy. With the help of our neighbor, we got Sam in to the garage and on a blanket. We REALLY wanted to try anything to save our boy, but our hearts new that it was Sampson's time to go on. So we made the agonizing decision to release him. We called our vet and they agreed to come out to our house. We got a call back from them. They had an emergency, and would get out there as soon as the could. We got the usual "keep him as comfortable as possible" speech.

We called Al's daughters as I knew they'd want to be there. Sampson had a special bond with Al's oldest daughter Jennifer as she only has one eye also.

At 6:45PM with all of us around Sam stroking him and telling him we loved him, our boy let out one last rather peaceful breath and died on his own.

Al and I have often talked since that although Sampson gave us many gifts throughout his time with us, that his passing on his own was his one last gift to us. He knew how we'd agonized over making that call to release him, and well, he didn't want us to feel any guilt for making that decision, so he figured, he'd take the repsonsibility himself.

A necropsy report revealed that Sam suffered a blood clot to the heart, and that was what actually took his life.

Sampson, you were our best friend, our companion, a joy to all those who came in contact with you, but mostly, you were our boy.

You touched us in ways you'll never know.

You've meant more to us then you could ever imagine.

And we miss you and love you more then you'll ever know.

Godspeed precious boy. Go get em at "da poke-her tabils".

We love you Sampson.

Mom and Dad
(Dee and Al)