The Guilt

It only took us a few WEEKS to realize that the discoloration of his nose had gotten out of control. There were other signs, too. He was moodier than usual, and he seemed to be whining alot. For those of you who have westies, whining comes with the territory. They will not be ignored. He was whining more than normal, but we just attributed it to the lack of attention.

Then, suddenly, it got worse over-night. When that happened, we were congnizant of the little attention we had been paying him. It makes me sad, and I feel a little guilty, to think about it. To think of all the life we have shared together, and now that he's reaching his declining years, I barely have any time for him. That's hardly fair to him, or me either, although I was involved in all the decisions that led to our busyness.

Three years ago, just after Hurricane Katrina struck New Orleans, Jessica and I set out on a 5 week RV vacation across the country. We wanted to see what we could while still young and kid-free, and chose the RV style so we could take our dogs with us. We had two westies, Murphy and his sidekick Molly (also a westie). She was younger and wilder, but less hardy. To our IMMENSE surprise, she contracted leptospyrosis and died on the trip. We were devastated, but pushed on and completed our trip to Yellowstone / Grand Tetons with heavy hearts. Despite his sadness, Murphy had some great moments, like jumping and splashing in ice-cold mountain streams while hiking.

After having been such an integral part of our life, it is difficult to reconcile the new lifestyle (children) that gives him so much less attention.

On a medical update, the steroids he was on wreaked havoc on his kidneys, so we had to stop. This means that the facial disfiguration has gotten worse. His ears got infected, so he's on antibiotics. I'll let Jess give the rest of the medical update, and some pictures.

Updated Pictures Murphy

Here are pictures of Murphy taken yesterday (11-20-08). The lesions on his nose are what sent us to the vet in the first place. I think my camera is running low on battery because the pictures aren't as quality as I would like. You can see the lesions on his nose, eyes and ears. I hate to say it, but they have actually improved!

So far, so good.

Murphy has been on Prednisone and antibiotics now for 2 days. The Prednisone seems to be working wonders. He is more like himself than he has been in months. It is making him hungry and thirsty and he has had a few accidents in the house....but otherwise he is "generally" better. Would I say he's the same ol' Westie I've always known? Absolutely not. He is slower, sleepier, and maybe just a little cranky but he is a Westie afterall! He has wagged his tail at me in the morning (which he hadn't been) and he has come over for a pet or scratch on the back. He is also showing interest in treats and even managed to get up on his back legs today to reach for a treat from our 2 year old. I don't know how long we have with Murphy. Since I am a nurse, I know what the Pred. is doing to his already weak kidney's. I know he is 13 years old. I know that Lupus is an autoimmune disease and with that come a cart load of other issues. But, for now I'm happy with the wag of his tail and the sometimes bright eyes that look at me. He is comfortable and happy and that's good enough for us right now. He has almost two weeks left on the steroids and then we'll check his blood levels to see where we are. He got groomed yesterday and that alone makes him look more like my Westie. Hope springs eternal.

The Early Signs

It turns out that discoloration of the nose is an early sign of Lupus. Who knew? As Murphy had gotten older, his pink skin had begun to darken, specifically on his belly. Between aging and his lively lifestyle, we didn't think much of it. In fact, we barely noticed it.

Then one day we looked and the discoloration had spread across his nose and crusted over. Of course, we took him to the vet right away. But, as it seems frequently happens, he was misdiagnosed. The doctor didn't know what it was, and sent him home with an antibiotic shot.

After a week, it didn't improve, so we took him back to the same doctor. She gave us anti-fungal cream to put on his nose. That didn't improve things, so we took him to a different doctor. At first they thought it was Pemphigus. But, the more they searched thru medical texts (yes, they dug the books out for this one!), we realized that he had all the symptoms of Lupus.

To know definitively, they would have to biopsy, which meant general anesthesia. For the last year, Murphy has been on a low-protein diet because he's in the early stages of renal failure (kidneys). The anesthesia would be hard on his kidneys, so we opted to pass on the test, but treat the disease.

Introduction

We just found out that our Westie of 13 years has Lupus, and an advanced case at that! I'd only barely heard of this disease yesterday. Today I got to meet it front and center.

The smiling face at the right is the spritely, lively dog of a few years ago. Since then, his life has changed dramatically with the loss of his longtime faithful companion female westie, the addition of 2 bigger dogs, and finally our baby daughter who is now 2 years old.

Over that time, he's gone from center of our lives to actually being treated as a dog with the others. We barely noticed when his skin started to discolor on his nose. He's a very active dog, sometimes getting into it with the other dogs and other times digging and tunneling like his ancestors. It went downhill from there.