Max has always been an energetic, highly intelligent, inquisitive, dog! This year he's going to be 18 and he's still chasing squirrels, wrestling with other dogs, bouncing and chasing the deer! He's also recently taken up chasing speedboats... although he's stuck on the beach - he hasn't mastered swimming yet but loves to splash! Physically Max is as spry as a 5 or 6 year old! Still to this day!

Over the last few months I started to notice his hearing start to deteriorate, and his eyes seemed to start to cloud. I didn't think too much of it, I just assumed he was aging. He did seem a little depressed but I assumed that went along with losing his hearing and his vision not being what it was before. I started to notice he was getting a little more lethargic though and took him a couple of times to various vets to have him checked out. We recently moved to an area where we don't have all the specialists we're used to and I'm still trying to find the best vets in this area. We did blood work, x-rays of his body and checked out his joints and all we could come up with was he had severe spondylosis... which most dogs his age do.. I still felt like something was wrong but nobody could put their finger on it...

Then one thursday night after a walk where Max seemed to be moving very slowly (which was odd) I noticed him starring off into space at his reflection in the window.. He couldn't hear me when I called him.. Slowly his head started to tilt, and then when he tried to move, he could only walk in circles to the right, moving in tighter and tighter circles until he'd fall over. A little voice inside my head just told me "this is quick" I didn't know what that meant but I was worried that this was it.. it was a stroke, or something that was going to affect him very quickly. I didn't want to take him to the ER if this was going to be "quick" so I helped stear him to the bed room and crawled into the dog bed next to him to help hold him in down. The next morning he was in the same condition, so I called our veterinary neurologist back in DC and we ended traveling back to DC to see him.

They did a quick exam and came up with a few ideas of what it could be, but wanted to do an MRI and a spinal tap to be sure. I said ok to the MRI but not the spinal tap. I didn't want to do anything invasive. The MRI came back with a tumor on his brain stem as well as something on his meninges (could be meningitis, or meningioma or lymphoma - they weren't sure without doing a spinal tap)... I still said no to the spinal tap (which maybe I shouldn't have at that time - because I took a chance on treatment and the treatment for meningiomas and lymphoma could really hurt him if it was an infection.) I got lucky though. As much as I've never been a fan of prednisone, the neurologist wanted to put him on a short tapering course of prednisone and see how he did on it. He was put on 10mg.

Within 3 days the spinning had stopped, within 5 days he was back to normal and running.

I had also called our holisitc vet in DC, as well as the holistic vet where we live now and they both came up with the same plan for him which was good! He started on acupuncture the day after we got home, we started him on some immune boosting stuff given into his own blood system, a vitamin B injection for energy. We are big believers in Traditional Chinese Medicine, and energy healing (reiki, laying hands, praying, or what ever you call it) and have seen it do amazing things with our pets and people we know for years (and I suppose it's been doing amazing things for 1000's of years) so we started him on some chinese herb forumulas 1st he was started on Stasis Breaker to help break up the tumor, and then we moved him to Stasis of the Mansion to break it up even more, and we also added Wei Chi Booster. I have him on Astragalus as well , he's on a good healthy cancer diet (which he's been on all his life and probably why he's 18... good food, lots of exercise, and an avoidance of vaccinations when we can) No grain, no sugars, etc.

After 3 weeks his neurologist wanted to see him so we made another trip up. He couldn't believe how well Max was doing and said he has 6 and 7 yr old patients who don't present as healthy as Max does. Max tried to chase his penlight for examining eyes across the room when it reflected! The doctor said that the only thing that was off was his extreme peripheral vision - his hearing had come back and his eyes were clear again! We were so curious as to how he was doing so well that we did another MRI (which required him to be put under again) and then we did a spinal tap this time.

Oddly enough the masses had not changed at all, but his brain seems to have rewired itself very quickly and very well!

Unfortunately Max doesn't do well with anesthesia, drugs, or spinal taps .. so we ended up setting him back quite a bit by doing that and that was a HUGE regret of mine and I think our neurologist.

[We were given a few options for treatment:
a) surgery (might be too tricky)
b) radiation (no way)
c) chemo (not very comfortable after our experience with Daisy - see her profile)
d) prednisone

I knew no matter what the treatment was we'd also be using chines medicine and alternative therapies.

It took a good week+ for him to bounce back to normal. We had to start back on pred every day again too and taper back. This time our holistic vet in DC (who is working with another dog with a brain tumor) said they were using a soy based natural hydrocortisone that is supposed to work like Prednisone except it doesn't have the dangers of messing up your kidneys and liver, so the plan was to wean him off the prednisone and on to that.. We're still messing around with the dose at this point, but what seems to be working very well for us is the following (for a 48lb dog)

Week 1 - 1 10mg prednisone / day
Week 2 - 1 pred Every Other Day / 1 natural pill alternate days
Week 3 - 1 soy every day and 5mg pred every other day

I'll keep updating this as we go.. but this is how we've been since the 2nd MRI.

Last night Max went for an hour walk in the woods and then down to the creek and barked at the birds and explored.

This morning Max went for a 1.5 hour walk in town and hung out with all the people and dogs at the farmers market, played with some kids, begged for food, and he's raring to go for his evening walk right now (as he runs across the house because one of our other dogs barked that there were deer in the front yard!)

7-29-2011
Update on Max.. He's still doing fantastic! A few nights ago in the 120 heat indexed heat, he saw a deer and took off through the woods after it! I was pretty worried that something would happen - although nothing bad has happened since his initial incident when he ended up with vertigo and couldn't walk 2.5 months ago.. Then I heard some screaching.. I started to run towards it and found Max had discovered our neighbor's Chicken Coup! No blood, no foul (seriously! All survived) And he meandered home back through the woods and still had energy to play! Last night our gang of dogs was chasing deer in the back yard and discovered some bees/yellow jackets.. and they all got stung.. Max on his ear.. Again he came out of that fine too! (upon googling bee sting and brain tumor I found a website that talks about how bee stings are being used to fight cancer - scorpion stings for brain cancer.. not exactly what got him.. but I'm kind of glad about that.. Any scorpion stinging must be done in a controlled environment or not a all... http://www.beewelltherapy.com for anyone who is interested..

1) Keep a very positive attitude
2) fight to get doctors you feel most comfortable with - when we first took Max to the neurologist, our regular guy was not there (the owner), we had an intern and the chief of staff who was managing the intern. I don't doubt they know their stuff, but when I asked questions the intern couldn't answer them b/c he was focused on what seemed to be his "script". The chief of staff did answer the questions and I like her a lot. She is very conservative and I appreciate that and in some cases and some situations I would love that a lot. I had an established relationship with the owner of the neurology clinic going back years and through 3 pets and I like his frankness, his confidence, and his knowledge of new research, cutting edge stuff and what works and what doesn't. He also does a lot of stuff by his gut. He's very open to alternative medicine as well. When I asked to see him the 2nd time I was told that I was not his patient this time around. I had to call 2 times and talk to 2 different receptionists and plead my case to get to talk with him. I had previously emailed him directly but he didn't respond, he let the chief of staff respond. When I finally was able to get an appointment with him he emailed me and responded, and when we were in for the apt, he explained he didn't want to step on anyone's toes.. which I totally understand, but I know we got the best care, I know I can talk frankly with him, and I know I can get the answers I need from him and he'll be a straight shooter. He also is open to working with me on some new research stuff that will probably take 10+ years to figure out but if we can make it happen it'll help a lot of dogs down the road.
3) Get a 2nd and 3rd opinion
4) follow your gut if you feel something is off.. your gut is always right
5)Be open to alternative therapies - Traditional Chinese Medicine, Alternative therapies, energy healing, and consider combining them with conventional or other alternative therapies
6) do your research and find out as much as you can - you need to be your pet's best advocate!