Month: October 2020

Well just as most of you have said, days 3 and 4 have been really rough on our little guy. We are mastering going to the bathroom which is amazing, but the sadness upon his sweet face is just heartbreaking. We can tell he is in immense pain. His behavior has also changed too—he’s wanting to hide in rooms and under tables away from the family, which is not like him. We did make a few calls to the surgery team today and they prescribed another pain medicine to add in. Throughout the day, we are also icing to help with swelling. I did notice some bruising on his stomach and sent in pictures to our vet as well. They also reassured me that it is very normal and we may see some fluid build up as well, which we started noticing this afternoon.

We know it’s going to get worse before it gets better, but we just want to see his spunky, energetic, life of the party personality to show again really soon! We know it will come with time so we are staying optimistic and taking it day by day! Pain management and keeping him comfortable is going to be our focus 10000% in the coming week. Please pray for Otto (and our breaking hearts) ❤️

Otto is doing very well on day 2 post-op! We had a rough afternoon yesterday after he arrived home. It took some time for him to get used to his new space and he was very nervous going outside to use the bathroom. He ended up laying down to pee the first time 😞. BUT, we continued to encourage him and the more we took him out, the more confident he got and is doing much better today. We have walked him around a little more today and he is getting used to his new hop—our 3 year old thinks it’s funny and giggles! Hey, we can all have a little giggle, right? The more positive we can all be around him the better so we think it’s ok 😊! We are looking forward to watching the progression each and everyday. We can already see his determination and know he’ll be back to his crazy self in no time!

Dropping Otto off for his surgery was an awful feeling, especially during COVID! We had to drop him off at the front door to the surgery vet tech, which was very sad—he was so scared! The hour ride home was full of tears, prayers and pep talks about how we were doing the best thing for him!

We didn’t know exactly what time Otto’s surgery was so we waiting anxiously all day. We got a call around 1pm from the surgeon as they were gearing up for surgery. Well the butterflies started fluttering in our bellies for the next few hours as we waited to see how our lil guy did. We continuously prayed for  positive outcome and successful surgery. About 3.5 hours later, we received a call from the surgeon saying that Otto did well and was resting comfortably. The surgeon has that calm about him that just put us at ease knowing our Otto was in good hands. Late that evening we received another call from one of the surgery vet techs who updated us that Otto was awake, alert and doing so well! She constantly reassured us he was in good hands and they would take amazing care of him! This made our hearts so happy. Sleeping through the night was rough as we laid and wondered how he was doing, worried if he was in pain, sad we couldn’t be there to comfort him. As we wake up on this Saturday morning, we doing our normal routine with the kids and are anxiously awaiting a call from the surgery center to see if we are able to pick up Otto today. We have the house all ready for his arrival. Not knowing what to expect is a scary feeling though! We are committed to doing all we can to ensure he is comfortable and well taken care of! Stay tuned for how we get through the first few days of recovery! In the meantime, please pray for Otto 😊

Before the big day arrives tomorrow…

Hi, we’re the Kovacich family! Our best buddy, Otto, will be undergoing amputation tomorrow and will be an official member of the Tripawd community. As we anxiously await for this big, life-altering day for Otto and our family, we wanted to get started on our blog to share our story. This is the start of Otto’s journey…

We rescued Otto in 2015 and he has become a HUGE part of our family! He means the world to us (especially to our 3 year old and 3-month old who is just noticing how cool he is) and we will do all we can to ensure Otto lives the best life he can!

Otto was diagnosed with soft-tissue sarcoma on August 15, 2020. Shortly after discovering a lump on his elbow, we took him to the vet to get it checked out and received the unfortunate news that the results came back positive for cancer. We decided to take Otto to an Oncologist to determine severity and next steps. After check-ups, testing and several discussions with the oncology and surgery team, the options were to just remove the tumor or to amputate. There were several risks with just removing the tumor because it was attached to the bone. With how locally aggressive soft-tissue sarcoma is, a large area of tissue surrounding the tumor  needs to be removed to lessen the chance of it coming back. In Otto’s case, the lump is so close to the bone, therefore there is a high chance that not all the cancer could be removed and would most likely come back. The only true cure for Otto is amputation.

Back in 2015 (a few months before we adopted Otto), we lost our 3.5 year old Husky/German Shepard, Riley, to gastrointestinal lymphoma. This horrible cancer took her life in less than 2 weeks and this rocked our world. We didn’t have the opportunity to save Riley and that was a tough pill for us to swallow. After going through what we did with Riley, we wanted to give Otto every chance possible to kick cancer’s butt! We made the extremely tough decision to amputate and completely cure him. We know that Otto has a LONG life ahead of him and we wanted to give him the best chance at life, CANCER-FREE!

Otto’s surgery is tomorrow (10/23/2020) and we are nervously and anxiously awaiting this life-changing procedure. As prepared as we feel we are, we don’t truly know what to expect, how we will feel, how he will react, how our 3-year will react, and what recovery will look like for him-I’m sure all normal feelings, but still very scary!

We would like to THANK the Tripawds community for so much valuable information and hopeful stories. It feels so good to know we will have so much support and invaluable resources within this group.

As you wait for our post-op update, enjoy pictures of our beautiful Otto (and his best buddy Kade)!