In December 1987 a litter of Rottweiler pups were born. From the first day they had to be bottle fed. Their mother couldn’t do it. In April we went to pick out one of the pups to bring home. All the puppies were wrestling and playing and barking and growling, but one stood out. One had walked away from all the fun and had gone and hid underneath a car.
Mom and Dad knew that very second he was the one. He was so sweet and just wanted to give you love. We brought him home, named him Max, and had 10 wonderful years with him. His registered name was McDonald’s Maximum Security. He was a clown!! The more you laughed the more things he did. In January of 1998 he started to limp. He made a trip to the vet’s office and they said he had just torn a ligament in his knee and gave him rymadil and sent him on his way.
6 weeks later he was still limping and we had heard of a wonderful vet named Dr. Bob Cunningham. He x-rayed Max’s leg and said that he didn’t have ligaments in that part of his leg! He did say though, that poor Max had osteosarcoma and it was eating away the bone. In April of 1998 Dr. Bob came to our house and set Max free of all the pain he was suffering.
While Max was being diagnosed an old boyfriend of mine brought a dog home. He lived next door to us. She was beautiful. She had little green eyes and a pink nose and was a light chocolate color with the markings of a rottie. He said she was for me and I told him I couldn’t keep her. He decided to keep her for himself. A few weeks later he moved and left her locked up in that house alone. He had abandoned that poor puppy. I had a key so I went down to take care of her until I found her a home.
Well all of this was happening while Max was being diagnosed with cancer and we were losing him. My father decided that he wanted her, number one to give her a home and a good life and number 2 to help take some of the pain of loosing Max away. She came to live with us the very day we lost Max, and to be honest, if she wouldn’t have been there to keep us laughing that day we would have been lost.
We found out that she was half rottie and half chocolate lab and was about 3&1/2 months old. She was so full of life and was so funny her name became Lucy after Lucille Ball. That was who she reminded us of. After about a year my father found another abandoned dog at his work that he brought home. She was almost dead and no one was sure that she would make it through that first night, but she did. We named her Sassy. Well Lucy Renee and Sassy Marie became inseparable. They were absolutely best friends.
When Lucy was 3 she started to limp and she went to the vet. She also went to Dr. Bob but she saw his associate Dr. Suzette too. They said that they didn’t think she had cancer but rather a fracture in her front leg, but they did a biopsy to be sure. When the test results came back they said she did in fact have osteosarcoma. We decided to keep her comfortable for as long as we could and when her quality of life was gone we would let her go. We brought her home and a couple of days later she was fine. No limping, no nothing! She was back to her old self. She didn’t even need pain medication.
She certainly surprised us. She was like that for a whole year and then a tumor started to form. We then let Dr. Bob amputate her leg. When Lucy came home she was back to being herself. We were very surprised. She did great for 6 months and then the cancer came back and hit her hard. Lucy went downhill fast and lost her battle to this terrible disease on
September 27, 2002. Dr. Bob came to our house as he had done with Maxabell. He made an impression of her foot for my father to have to remember her by and then told her he was going to set her free. I think Dr. Bob cried as much as we all did. Everyone said their goodbyes and then Sassy was allowed to tell her best friend goodbye.
Dr. Bob and Dr. Suzette of Veterinary Associates of Hattiesburg have done so much for my family. After Dr. Bob laid Lucy to rest he and Dr. Suzette made a monetary donation in Lucy’s name to The Morris Foundation. We can’t say enough about these wonderful people. They truly are an animal’s friend and we will never forget the kindness they have shown my family.
Lovingly submitted by Reagan Andrews. Click here to write to Max's and Lucy's family.
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