Champion of My HeartA real-time memoir about life with a fearful border collie, by Roxanne Hawn

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I don’t much remember what life with Lilly was like before she got so sick with an adverse rabies vaccine reaction called meningoencephalomyelitis in January 2012. Taking care of her fills my days. Our world has gotten quite small, but we feel joy at even the tiniest “normal” thing — such as playing fetch. Here, friends, is a little video update.

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It’s official. I’ve fallen out of the habit of blogging. It’s complicated. Today, for example, my plans to finish work early so that I could clean my house (which is getting scary) got slaughtered by imminent, unexpected work demands from 3 different clients. Since it looks like I’ll be cleaning all evening, I’m trying to make some space in my brain to write a real update about Lilly. Let’s see how it goes.

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Not nearly enough chocolate or ice cream in the house for a week like this, but here is a short recap of this week’s (mostly good) news … after Lilly became increasingly wobbly and weak, starting last Sunday.

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We got mostly good news today from Lilly’s blood and basic urine tests. The urine culture takes several more days, but Lilly’s complete blood count (CBC) and senior dog blood chemistry panel look good. So, there is no reason we cannot go ahead with her cytarabine injections (“chemo”) tomorrow and Thursday. As for the sudden wobbly-weakness? Into the unknown we go …

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Poor Tom. As soon as I headed to town to see my mom Tuesday afternoon, things went to #*!!. When I returned a couple of hours later, I saw signs of things amiss. Here is the sad, sad tale.

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