The 'easy' weeks for Gaby.

March 18 - April 8, 2008.

This is as easy as it gets in the chemotherapy world! Gaby went through an easy regiment for 3 weeks after a 2 week cycle of Vistincrine and Elspar. For those 3 weeks, Gaby just received Vistincrine and no Elspar.

Another thing that we found made it very easy on Gaby was that the vet allowed us to bring her in the morning to get her blood and then take her back home until it was time for the Vist. The first 2 weeks when Gaby got home, she had been so worked up by staying at the vets all day that she was so thirsty! She must have just stressed herself up so much that she panted heavily all day. You see, Gaby is not very socialized. We have a fenced in yard that she has lived in her entire life. She loved her brother Gambit but never got a chance to go out and get used to outsiders and other dogs.

My wife in the mean time has done some research on the Internet on this subject and decided to give Gaby additional supplements to help her body with the treatments. The vet really didn’t mention any supplements but I believe they will do her a great deal of good.

Arginine (1000 MG / day)– amino acid that helps with metabolic stabilization.
Fish oil (4000mg / per day) Recommended 1000MG per every 20lbs of dog) – omega 3
Glutamine (1500 mg / day)– got this in powder form. The clerk had recommended the powder over liquid to save a little money.

We also got her Iams Puppy Chow because it was highest in protein and lowest in carbs. The reason is that is used sorghum fillers instead of wheat.

She has shown a little weight loss which is concerning. Day 11, Thursday evening she started to show loss of appetite for the first time. The next morning she was very reluctant to eat and had to be hand fed. Ate the rest because we put egg on her food. 15 minutes after she ate she vomited. Jennifer went to the vet that afternoon to get extra medication for Gaby’s naseua. Later Dr Bowden sent an email saying that she feared that we were in for a rough weekend! We also discontinued the prednisone on the recommendation of the vet until Monday because her tummy needed a rest. I remember that when Gambit was taking pred for his cancer that he also took tummy meds to help him out.

Metoclopramide 10MG – sub q injection : for naseau
1 hour later – Sucralfate 1MG – dissolved in water orally: GI protectant
Mitazapine 30MG :
30 minutes later: Pepcid 10MG for acid


1 hour after injection she showed signs of improvement but she was reluctant to take oral medication. Coaxed them down anyway. 1 hour and ½ later her appetite returned and fed on her own.

The next morning she needed some coaxing for her food so we added some egg and she ate the entire thing with no problem.

Continued to eat with egg and continued GUI protectant and Pepcid for a week.

By the second easy week Gaby was eating without much help (Benefuls or Chicken stock helpers in her food). She seems to feel great. The prednisone has turned her into a begging mess however. She acts just like Gambit did on his pred.... everytime I get up to go into the kitchen, Gaby gets up and follows me. I guess I must snack too much! Gambit did the same thing and now I know that the pred must be making her crazy.

The only thing that has changed on the drugs is that we found Cytoxan pills online at a Canadian pharmacy. This is a pill that is supposed to be given with the protocol that we are using but they are on backorder in the US. We told our vet of our find and she checked the site out. She reported back that she was amazed at the price, nearly a 5-1 savings. She wrote us an Rx and we called the pharamacy. We bought 100 pills at 50MG for $90.

I was thinking that if we were going along ok without the pills, why would we all of a sudden start giving it to her? It was explained to me that this gives her a much better chance of staying in remission by giving her the pills. Why go thru all of this shit and then skimp out on these pills? Espcecially since we found them and they are so cheap compared with the rest of the $$.

We have one more week of easy before the big guns are brought out. For that, I am nervous.