It's Still Okay to Slow Down.
They say it takes 21-days to form a habit.
It’s a practice, but it’s also the passage of time, adherence to rhythms, an adjustment. If it takes time to get into something, it takes time to come out of it, too. Just ask a dog. When the weather changes, they need two weeks to two months to adjust, especially when going from one extreme to the next. That’s why there are dog sweaters and jackets, paw wax and little booties, clothes that are cute but are also a way to keep them cozy or cool as their bodies adjust.
I thought about this as we prepared for a new phase of the pandemic. We’ve spent years in transition, it seems, forming habits to deal with the extremes. To keep ourselves safe. I want to come out of this more like a dog, to take two weeks to adjust, maybe longer, maybe a month. To go gently and shift slowly. To attempt not to overschedule, even when the world tries to overschedule me.
Go too fast, and you might miss something.
The month after Petey Sellers finished chemo, August 2021, I felt a lump. Less of a lump and more of a lymph node, swollen and on the right.
I panicked.
I’d been working really hard at not panicking, creating all of these tools to ease anxiety and be in the moment. But at that moment, all I had was fear. He’d just gone into remission, and we’d spent the last month helping him recover from the effects of his final dose. After he got better, we went to the beach! Our first trip since December 2019. We made plans to see friends and do things. Less caretaking, more living. But then the Delta variant emerged and we locked down, again. This meant more isolation, but also more nightly massages, slowing down, which is how I spotted the swollen node.
It’s too soon, my brain rattled off as I sang our cancer-free song to him in the car on the way to the clinic. I don’t have a plan, I thought. But I sang the song, anyway, like a promise. Like hope.
It was the middle of August, hot and sticky, so I parked outside in the back of the clinic underneath a shade tree. I’m a freckled, sun-sensitive strawberry blonde, so waiting in the car for him in the summer was almost worse than the winter. I wore all of my sun gear - sun shirt, hat, legs covered, sunglasses. We’d been through a heat dome, so Petey had protective gear, too – sun shirt and booties. I only wished his gear could protect him from what was possibly going on inside of him, too.
“His right node is swollen,” the vet said, over the phone fifteen minutes later. “We’re going to biopsy it, and we’ll send you some estimates. Then we can talk next steps.”
I stood there, stunned, and also overheated. It was the opposite of that day in December 2020 when he’d been diagnosed, a day when it was barely 30 degrees outside and I had to make a treatment decision while sitting in the car with a blanket over my knees, teeth chattering.
Cold to hot. Well to not. One extreme to another.
I opened the e-mail on my phone and looked at the estimates they’d sent for more chemotherapy. If the cancer was back, we weren’t going to do CHOP therapy again, the one we’d just finished that took six months and thousands of dollars. That left palliative care, which used prednisone, the drug that changed Petey’s personality and turned him into a zombie, or rescue protocols. With rescue protocols, you can only give each one a few times as a way to ease discomfort and buy some time to transition. Sometimes these treatments worked, but sometimes they didn’t. When you perform a rescue, you’re not always successful.
The pages I’d printed felt heavy in my hands. I read about different therapies and their side effects, some sounding worse than the ones he’d already endured. There’s not a lot of guidance and, at its best, choosing the next step is guesswork. Each drug works differently with each dog. And while some dogs beat the odds and have a nice, long remission, the outcome is eventually the same. There’s no cure for canine lymphoma. This wasn’t the kind of decision I wanted to make in the 90-degree heat, but I also didn’t want to make it without consulting Petey. I always thought that, when the time came, we’d do one therapy and then let him go, but what if the rescue made him worse? What if it caused more suffering? How could I possibly know how to give my best friend the best end? He knew, I thought. He always knew. I just needed to tap into him and ask: how do you feel? What do you want?
I closed my eyes, preparing to connect when I heard him bark. I looked up and there he was, grinning and prancing toward me.
“It’s just fat,” the vet said, smiling as she handed me his leash.
“What?” I said.
“The lump,” she said. “We biopsied it twice and didn’t find cancer cells. So I looked back at his weight, and as it turns out, he gained a lot during chemo. It’s not a swollen lymph node, it’s just fat!”
I started laughing, wild with relief.
“It’s just fat??!” I said, looking from her to Petey, who was wagging his tail enthusiastically.
“It’s just fat,” she said, grinning and petting Petey, who was now dancing around like he was king of the world which, let’s face it, he was.
I’m pretty sure we didn't hug due to the Delta surge, but in my memory, we did. On the ride home I cranked up the music and we sang, air-conditioning blasting. I stopped at a drive-through for an iced coffee for me and a small cup of whipped cream for him. We’d look at his calories the next day, but that day, we celebrated the hell out of his strong, beautiful body, the one with the little extra fat. That one that was still here.
A few days ago, I felt a bump on Petey’s neck.
He’d always had a bump there, something the oncologist called an “old man thing,” but something to watch. It was Petey’s 8-month anniversary from chemo, the end of that magical period the oncologist had mentioned when finished chemo, that six-to-eight months without intervention period. Anyone who knows Petey, though, knows that he seems happy, healthy, and stronger than ever, especially when the sun comes out. Except for some arthritis and knee stuff, he acts like a puppy, playing with sticks, running with his leash, and tossing toys around the room like he’s five years old. It’s a sharp contrast to this time last year, hope in the form of a wagging tail and smiles. He has a recheck next week, and I know I need to read the information, to be prepared, but really, he seems good. More than good. Maybe this lump is due to less activity during the winter. Maybe this lump is just a little extra fat, too.
In March 2021, as we were beginning to get vaccines and dreaming of coming out of the pandemic, I drew something from my mediation. It was the two of us, me and Petey, on a boat, holding each other, the sun shining above us. In the middle, it said: It’s Still Okay To Slow Down. At this time last year, we were still in the middle of chemo treatments, so not a lot was going to change for us, at least not until my second shot. But we were still thinking about seeing friends, opening up our lives more, preparing. I drew it to remind myself what I’d learned, and not just from my surgery, recovery, and the first year of the pandemic, but from what I was learning while helping my best friend go through chemo, too.
The world will always be in a rush.
There will always be some days that are busier than others, which is a good thing, but it’s wonderful to have practices in place to find some calm in the storm. Like that pause at the beginning and end of the day, a nice walk, making soup or drawing, in the evening, with your furry friend by your side. It’s still okay to slow down, Petey told me. So, I drew it. It carried me through last year, and it seems even more relevant, now.
It’s Still Okay To Slow Down.
Maybe our animal friends can be our guides.
Maybe the lessons he’s been teaching me the past few years are even more important now as I attempt to make my world a little bigger, again. Maybe now it will include more family, more friends, more pauses, pandemic or not. The capitalist world wants us all to be too busy to see, to be aware, to feel the need for more love in the world and for our planet. But the animals, as always, can remind us. They can show us the way. It’s Still Okay to Slow Down, Petey says. To be with me. To take two weeks, two minutes, a moment. You can’t even believe how great this world smells.
Even during busy weeks, I always make time for daily walks. I breathe in the fresh scent of spring as we move, grateful to still have him by my side, happy to have experienced this shift in these last two years, all of us shifting in different ways that will hopefully help shift the world as we move forward. Once again, Petey cheers us on, walking ahead of me, sniffing each and every blossom like hope.
It’s Still Okay to Slow Down, he says, one last time. As he wags his tail and smiles, I know that he’s right.
Art: Trooper!
After I made the meditation drawing in March 2021, I also made Petey a trophy for getting through his chemo treatments, a gold cup that championed what he was. A trooper! You’re a trooper, too. We’re all troopers, coming out of two years of our own experiences, shifting at our own rates and as we can, helping each other. Print this out for you, a friend, or your dog. We love you. You’re doing great! You’re a trooper.
As always, we hope you’re healthy and well. Thanks for reading, sharing, and subscribing. Subscribing is our fundraiser to help pay off chemo debt and raise money for The Morris Foundation. So far, these posts are free, nothing is behind a paywall. If you want to help, please subscribe monthly, yearly, or as a founding member. We truly appreciate it! And stay tuned for more content and goodies in the coming months, special treats for Secret Society members.
We heart you! xoxo, Kari and Petey Sellers
