Dogs and Cancer

I've been away for about a week. I don't know if any of you are from the Upper Penninsula in Michigan, or have visited there, but it's beautiful. I had kind of an unplanned internet diet -- we stayed in a pretty remote area, with very spotty access and no wireless. But it was worth it to capture some moments like this sunset near the Mackinac Bridge:

And I had some time for fun reading. I brought the book Secret Service Dogs with me. I have a family member who works for the Secret Service, and I love dogs, so it was a nice clearance rack choice for me.

The problem was, it made me miss my own dog, Strudel, and it got me thinking about dogs all week. I actually used to have Strudel be a guest blogger every now and then, long ago. Strudel is 12 years old now, and it seems like we're at the vet with her once a month these days. Nothing life threatening -- just getting older, and little things are affecting her more than they used to. It's very much the same for me and my wife -- we're just at an age where parts of us don't work as well as they used to. It's kind of cute to see both my wife and my dog take their eye drops together every night, for the same condition.

And when I as finally able to check my email and various messages, I had a few links related to dogs and cancer. Like this one about how dogs are playing a big role in researching some cancer treatments. And another one about a cancer that is found only in dogs, and that can be passed from one dog to another -- very unusual for a cancer. It has survived for 4000 years, and might teach researchers some other lessons about cancer.

Just a coincidence, I guess, that I get stories about dogs and cancer at a time when I've been missing my own dog so much. But that got me thinking about the other ways that dogs can be helpful to us as cancer patients. Dogs can be trained to sniff out cancer, for example, and the first cancer-sniffing dog was named George, a Standard Schnauzer like my dog Strudel. 

[That's not George, the cancer-sniffing dog. It's my Strudel, the very much not a cancer-sniffing dog.]

And dogs provide great comfort to many cancer patients in lots of ways. They are supposed to lower blood pressure, for example, and can be rained to help people who are dealing with lots of side effects from treatment.

Dogs are awesome.

If you have one, you already know that. You can make your dog's day extra special on August 10, which is Spoil Your Dog Day, or August 26, which is National Dog Day. (If you're looking for an excuse...)

Anyway, it's nice to be back, and I'm happy to be blogging again. And I'm happy to get a chance to think about dogs -- my own and others -- and the good things they can do for us.

I hope you all have the chance to get some comfort, from a dog or from someone or something else. Back to all that cancer research soon.