11 May 2024
Lyra was diagnosed with malignant histiocytosis today. We’re heartbroken; the prognosis is poor.
Recently, she was leaving more food in her bowl after meals and we’d noticed a few, tiny behavioral changes while on walks and at home. Last week, we made a Friday vet appointment thinking she had an upset stomach or digestive concern. They ran blood work, which led to additional evaluations and an x-ray. An unknown mass was spotted in her upper abdominal section; so we took her to a speciality ER clinic where they could perform more work.
The ER clinic performed new x-rays. Their diagnosis confirmed that she had a mass, suspected cancerous, in her abdomen/stomach around the “mediastinum” (space between lung spaces, heart, etc). Additionally, nodules were identified on her liver, which were later biopsied. Those biopsied cells resulted in a confirmed cancer diagnosis this evening.
Fuck cancer.
I’m a bit in shock. But I’m going to try to focus: I want to give her the most love and joy and happiness that I can, with whatever time we have.