Deacon's Story
The racing kennel owner brought him to GPA on February 24 of 2006. He was a medium sized boy, with a very red coat with some brindle markings and a black muzzle. He was very old to be in a racing kennel, five and half years.
He had the most horribly mangled right rear hock we had ever seen. “What is his name”, we asked? “Rooftop Dipstick” was the reply. “What do you call him”, we asked? “Dipstick” she laughed. I said that name will not do and asked Karen, one of the GPA kennel managers, to come up with a more fitting name, as it was plain to see he was a sweet boy. “How about Deacon”, she asked me. “Deacon it is”, was my reply.
The kennel owner told us that he broke his hock running a race in Sarasota in September of 2005 and was just put back in the crate with no vet care. The pain must have been horrible judging from the way the hock “healed”. There was a huge curve instead of the “point” in a normal hock. His toes were contracted, and he walked almost on his tip toes. We just shook our heads imagining the pain he must have endured. Deacon ran over 100 races, and made money for someone, however, no one cared enough about him to have a vet see him. An x-ray taken later by the GPA vet revealed an injury that needed orthopedic surgery to repair. The hock was a literal mosaic of small bits and pieces of bone just seeming to float. He was not even splinted or given pain meds..
He spent about five weeks in a large suite in the gpa kennel. When i had the room for another foster i decided to take him home as i planned to take him to “hip dog water therapy” for his right leg and foot. He attended several sessions and the toes had begun to loosen up a bit.
A month after he was with me, literally out of the blue, he cried in pain and held up his left foot—his “good” foot. An immediate trip to the vet revealed no source of pain, although he would not walk on the foot for a day. He quickly returned to his normal gait.
On june 5, a month later, i noticed a very slight limp on that “good foot”. A physical exam this time was extremely painful. X-rays revealed what i had been praying would not be.
He had cancer in what we thought was the good leg! how can this be? he already has one bad leg- - and now this? a bone aspirate was done but the results were “undiagnostic”. So off i went to the specialty vets with deacon’s x-rays on a disc. They were read by both the orthopedist and the radiologist.
Deacon has a damaging cancer in his “good leg” and they warned me that the leg could break at any time.
He was put on a pain medication but was walking normally and playing with the toys, something he had recently “learned” how to do. He had transformed from a shy kennel dog into a friendly, good natured sweetheart who loved his meals, his toys, and one particular doggie bed in the living room. I thought that i would have him with us for weeks—maybe even months.
Eight days after the diagnosis, he awakened me at 1:30 in the morning with heavy panting and crying.
I knew.
The pain must have worsened because he paced frantically around the house for the next five hours. He cried continually for the entire five hours like a baby and occasionally screamed loudly. I gave him three different types of pain medications but nothing even took the edge off his pain. He walked the house with the left foot up with the weight on the shattered right leg---which must have been painful also.
Brokenhearted, we knew what we must do. Early in the morning my husband, john, gently lifted him into the back of the expedition. I sat in the back with deacon---he could not get comfortable and kept trying to stand up—but he could not stand on the left leg, and the right leg could not hold his weight.
I held his head as he slipped out of this world and away from the pain with which he was all too familiar. I whispered the things we all whisper to our beloved companions at this horrible moment. Deacon passed away as deacon harris. I adopted him when i learned of the fateful diagnosis. He was officially a member of a family who not only loved him, but valued him for the gentle and innocent soul he was.
Deacon was five years and ten months old. I have his ashes and they will join those of the other greys we have loved and lost.
Rest in pain free peace, sweet Deacon.
Love, Joan, John, Alicia, Duchess, Guiness, Frankie, Brandy, Chalupa, Allie and Luke Harris