Help Lily kick cancer's ass and live a full life!

Hi my name is Libby. My family lost our dog Elvis to cancer in the spring of 2017. We lost 8 other friends and family from cancer, suicide, old age, overdose and heart attack etc over the next year. October 26 of 2017 i lost my brother to suicide. It was honestly more grief and tragedy in a short time than i had ever experienced. My grief and trauma were complicated and i had never felt so broken. I could hardly function. I couldn't work, eat, sleep, cook. It was a miracle if i could dress myself and work a couple hours.

I wanted to get a new dog ever since we lost Elvis but my family were not ready. In January of 2018 a neighbor showed me a sweet pic of a group of puppies called the Beatles bunch from a local rescue. I fell in love with a girl named Penny and showed her to my husband. He had been a hard no until that day. He saw her pic and said yes. In under 24 hours we applied to adopt, drove to Oregon and brought home our girl.

I had researched temperament testing. When we arrived intent on rescuing Penny i was maintaining an open mind to temperament. A little black puppy came and lay down next to my leg. Penny jumped on us, climbed all over us, mouthed and nipped and yelped playfully.

I looked to my husband and said "This (Penny) is not the dog for us. She is going to be too busy and a lot of work. This little black pup curled up next to me is the dog for us!"

My husband gets a little stubborn and has a hard time changing plans mid stream. He dug his heels in and said this is the dog we came for!

So we loaded Penny and ourselves back into the truck and began the drive back to Seattle from Eugene. Our boys,17 & 15, my husband and i went around and around on names over the long drive and she tucked herself into my lap and began to wrap herself around my heart. I had no clue how much work an 8 week old puppy could be or how bonded we'd become. We settled on the name Lily, Lilith.

For the next days , weeks, months even a couple years she rescued me from an incomprehensible grief. She barked and pawed and whined at me when she or i had a need. I would pull myself out of the pile of tears and physical pain and walk her, feed her, play with her. She brought me back to life, forced me to walk her, feed her, to live.

Lily is funny and playful and cuddly. She is also stubborn and smart and pushy. She is one of the best friends i have ever had. We swim together, sleep together, play together, hike together, hunt mushrooms together. I have terrible anxiety at times and she knows it is up before i do. When i am in grief she licks my tears , whines and can bring me to the present.

A few months ago i found a very small bump on her thigh with a small raised strip to another small bump. Having had bumps i worried about on pets before the vets had always dismissed so i assumed it was nothing, just a scratch. It was skin colored, not hot and she didn't notice it. I decided to watch it for a few weeks and see if it changed. It seemed to nearly completely disappear so i forgot about it.

A couple weeks ago i took her to the vet for a festering bump on her paw that she was gnawing at. They knocked her out to explore thoroughly. They said it was nothing and gave her an expensive medicine injection that is supposed to help with itching. She is already on an expensive prescription diet for her allergies and itching and digestive problems.

We returned home hopeful things would improve. While she recovered from the sedatives i pet her all over and snuggled her. I found the exact same two lumps connected by a raised line only now they were huge, red and looked terrible. I was freaking out. I had just spent a small fortune on a vet bill and now i was terrified this was cancer.

I called the vet. Made an appointment, returned. All the while praying i am worrying about nothing and will be so relieved when the Dr, as always, reiterates we are just playing safe by testing, it's not cancer.

After a week wait we go to the appointment. The vet says she is worried and needs to aspirate to identity the abnormal cells. She tells me "i know you want me to reassure you this is not cancer but i cannot do that. This is very worrying and fits the criteria of a mast cell cancer. We need to know what type and how aggressive before surgery".

Honestly i just cried and begged her to skip all that and take it off but cancer doesn't work like that. We will have a few steps - biopsy, cytology, bloodwork, ultrasounds etc before we even get to the surgery.

Not only am i anxious and terrified to lose my friend, my rescuer, my hiking buddy, my emotional support friend i have fear of how the heck i will pay for her various treatments once we have a solid diagnosis. She is only four and otherwise very healthy so if possible i will do everything within my power to save her like she saved me.

Lily gave my life back to me when i felt broken. She gave a mom back to her kids , a wife to her husband. I just want to give her the chance to live her full happy life like she gave me.

My husband suggested we wait to ask for help until we know fully what we face. I have done the research and if this is aggrsssive i want to be able to act fast. That will take money, potentially a lot of money we don't have. The amount requested may grow depending on if we need radiation or chemotherapy or more than one surgery. The amount requested could cover biopsy, ultrasound,bloodwork to be sure it hasn't spread to her organs before surgery and may cover some surgery as well. I don't have all that info yet other than on line research. I will update as i get information. Due to the holiday weekend we will not hear back until Wednesday or Thursday from the aspiration but i hope to have funds ready in advance for whatever is necessary.

If you can help please do. Whether you can help or not please share to any friends or communities you can so we can give Lily the best possible chance and care at beating this cancer! Thank you.

If by some miracle this is not cancer and we don't need some portion of the money or it has spread so far we cannot help her we will use what is needed for palliative care and donate the rest to a worthy cause- cancer research or another pet needing medical help.

Have a lovely day and thank you for reading and helping and sharing.