Koda's gonna make it.

For my blog friends not on Facebook, I wanted to give a quick update on our little guy, Koda. Seems he's going to be okay. I'm still a little giddy with the news.

A week from yesterday, I drove him three hours to Colorado Springs where we spoke with a veterinary orthopedic surgeon, board certified for ten years. We took some more x-rays and Koda received a thorough skeletal exam.

I was feeling horribly low before the appointment because Koda's doing so poorly. If you were to see him walk, you'd cringe for sure. He's in so much pain after a day of puppy cavorting that when 5:00 rolls around he can barely get around. It nearly brings me to tears.

So the appointment was our last chance at salvation. My regular vet thought for sure that the most humane option for Koda would be euthanasia. That's if the orthopedic vet confirmed his fears over his knees. At a friend's suggestion, I even enquired about the possibility of a doggy wheel-chair for Koda if his knees and hips were both irreparably diseased. I was told that would be cruel because Koda feels pain in his joints regardless of use. To lock him into a wheel-chair in that painful condition (he's not paralyzed after all) would be a punishing fate. So, needless to say, we were sad. All of us.

Arya says, "Why'd you come here little boy, if only to make us all so sad?" Koda replies, "Didn't mean to have such bad bones, but I knew you'd take care of me...."

So, in Colorado Springs, after much evaluation and honest dialogue and even a finger wagging at me for becoming too involved with New Mexico's dogs in need (it's a never ending tragic tide, according to this surgeon who's lived here himself), the doctor told me that Koda's knees are absolutely normal for a growing puppy.

He told me Koda's hips are his only concern and he's too small for the Total Hip Replacement surgery, the Cadillac of hip repairs (and comparable in price to a luxury car). He'd be glad to refer me to Texas where they're perfecting the "micro THR" for smaller animals, but honestly, he told me Koda would do beautifully with another procedure called the FHO. That brings the cost down from around $15,000 for the micro THR, to about $3000 for the FHO.

Do-able. We can do that for him. It may mean eating beans and rice for awhile, and no deck furniture for us this year, and no eating out for a good long while, etc, etc. But Koda's going to get another chance. And we're all on Cloud 9 since hearing the news.