In Memoriam.
Darcy Thornton
born November 11, 1999
died June 27, 2006.

Blessed Darcy rest in peace. Catch your breath. Love Dad.

We couldn't have asked for a better first puppy. Darcy, you made raising a puppy seem like the easiest thing in the world. Your nickname was The Perfect Puppy. You could just see the light go on in your head every time you learned something new--which was constantly. Living with you and seeing you spread all that sweetness and love to everyone you met has been one of the great pleasures of our life. Love Mom.

The last update from ACC is not good. They don't believe Darcy will get any better no matter what they do now. Please keep thinking and praying for her.

Update for Darcy (who's not feeling much like blogging right now): ACC is giving her pedialyte instead of water. I guess her electrolyte levels were so low that it was determined they were the greater risk than the edema in the lungs. She is eating some when hand fed, but she continues to have periodic episodes of panting and gagging. We should know more about her prognosis shortly. Thanks so much to everyone who's left comments and emailed. Your love and concern for Darcy mean so much to us. Hopefully, she'll pull through this episode and we can all claim to have helped.

Darcy wouldn't ask this for herself so I'm going to ask for her: Pray for her please. She's back in the hospital, under oxygen, and her prognosis is not good. Her electrolytes are way out of balance due to the large amounts of furosemide she's needed and treatment for the imbalance fights the furosemide. She's a trooper and still fighting, but we don't know how much longer she'll hold out. Hopefully, the doctors at Advanced Critical Care in Tustin can work a miracle, so please help them with your thoughts and prayers. Dad.

What vicious circle! I need to be handled and carried to go potty, but it distrupts my breathing, and I love to be handled but I hate coughing and not being able catch my breath. I get stressed and then MomDad don't want to disturb me, and then it's time to pee again. Sigh.

Mom writes in an email: today at Noon, Darcy took her shot like a champ, ate some mango and some Charley Bear treats, and went outside to pee. So it sounds like Darcy's hanging in there!

I do NOT like those lasix shots! They make me agitated, and then I get out of breath, and I wander and can't get comfortable, barka, barka, barka (yada, yada in human). I did OK with the midnight shot, but I'm not handling the 6AM today shot too well. It was an 0.8 ml shot. Mom has a call into Dr. Schroeder to see if I need to go back into the oxygen cage.

Thank Dog I'm back home now! I'm still having some breathing trouble and don't have any energy left, but Dr. Barrett and Dr. Schroeder figured that since I wasn't doing any better in the oxygen cage I might as well go home. My appetite is still good so they feel pretty good about my status. I am now on injectable lasix rather than pills, my hydralozine was doubled and so was my pimobendan (sorry, I repeat myself with that one; it's the drugs ;-)). Luckily MomDad have LOTS of experience giving shots; they used to serve a cat named Peter that had diabetes and they had to give him his insulin twice a day for 10 years! Demanding Cat! But at least I can count on MomDad doing the same for me if I should need it.

I'm still in the hospital. Dr. B didn't feel I was able to go home Saturday, but maybe today. MomDad came to see me which I really liked, but I still didn't have a lot of energy. I sat up for them and licked their noses, though. MomDad said they would come visit me today. I hope I'm more energetic for them.

I'm resting comfortably tonight at California Animal hospital. I REALLY appreciate all the prayers and concern, and I give big licks to everyone. I hope to come home tomorrow so I can lick everyone in person.

I have to stay overnight with Dr. Barrett. My lungs are filling with fluid more rapidly than before and I'm in the oxygen tent. Dr. B is going to send me home with Lasix injections cause the pills and compounds weren't working very well.

Oh, boy. I'm not doing too well. I was rather lethargic last night, with some shallow breathing, and Mom has taken me to Dr. Barrett. I was good about peeing and lasted through the night, but Mom is definitely worried. I know everyone is interested, so I'll keep you posted.

Well, I'm certainly peeing a lot. MomDad and Dr. Barrett upped BOTH my diuretics so I'm drinking a lot more and it's got to go somewhere! Of course, MomDad have to take me out a lot more frequently, like at 3AM. I don't like being asleep and then trying to wake them when I'm so full I going to burst.

The up side is that I'm definitely NOT sounding wet anymore, and my breathing is easier.

Bella now has to be carried up and down the stairs. She has a bruised spinal disk and some sort of arthritis in her spine. Mom took her to Advanced Critical Care in Tustin the other morning at 3:30. I hope Twyla doesn't need to be carried down stairs; three of us dogs and only two of MomDad. Good biceps work for them though, hee!

We now think that my furosemide wasn't adjusted high enough several weeks ago. I got better for a few days after the first extra set of doses, and then I started to get "wet" again back on my regular dose. They started giving me 10mg extra every six hrs yesterday. I'm better today, but my breathing is still a little shallow, although my rate is back down around 32-35; it was up over 40 last night. And of course the heat doesn't help either. We have a call into Dr. Barrett to discuss my meds. I felt good enough this morning to lick Dad's nose several times when we went outside. He looked like he needed some cheering up.

I had a worse than normal day on Sunday. I was coughing and breathing very "wet". Luckily Dr. Barrett had told MomDad that they could give me one or two emergency doses of furosemide if I should need it. We had some liquid furosemide around and Dad gave 20mg of that to me first, the thought being that the liquid would work faster, and then later on in the day I got another 20mg tablet 1/2 with each of my next two regular doses. Seems to have worked; I was breathing better by late that evening and seemed all better by Monday. I may have eaten something with sodium that MomDad didn't know about; I'm good about eating found food as fast as I can.

Nothing new to say, just checking in. Boy, are we glad June gloom is back in SoCal. It was so hot for a while, I couldn't get comfortable. I'd move from cool spot to cool spot on the floor. The heat didn't help during park day, either, even though MomDad did their best to keep me in the shade.

Oh My Dog, there were a lot of tricolor cavs at the park, it seemed at least half of them were puppies! I hate to say it but they were pretty cute. I'm still the champion licker, though.

MomDad took me to Park day Saturday. Our friend Tamela organizes a Saturday get together in Mission Viejo for anyone with cavaliers. Sometimes there are talks by local veterinarians, but this time Tamela gave a grooming demonstration. MomDad loaded up my wagon and we had a good time. We met a woman who had lost her cavalier companion in Feb due to MVD. It was sad to hear her story.

I enjoyed park day, but I was stressed the rest of the day: shallow breathing, never comfortable, all the signs of respiratory distress, so that will probably be my last park day. I'm fine now, but it just took too much out of me to allow MomDad to take me again. I loved walking around and checking out every bag for treats, though. I'll miss that.

I'm so glad we adjusted my meds. I feel more alert, I have more energy, and I even try to play with Bella and Twyla when they return from their walks, so I'm better than I was. I've even stopped coughing, again. Dr. Barrett had said all along that we had lot's of room to adjust my furosemide and my other drugs. The only problem was that my B.U.N. numbers had crept up to the high normal area, so we need to keep a watch on that.