My Friend Furby

Furby is normally around 70 pounds. He is Australian Shepard and long hair German Shepard. He has been a truly amazing dog. He's now around 11 years old and he has lived with us since he was about 17 months to 2 years old.

Recently, my wife took him to the doctors for a checkup and the doctor after x-raying him found a tumor that at the she thought was cancerous. But further tests determined that it was not so my wife called me and asked if we could get it removed. Intuitively, it seemed like the right thing to do for our old friend, so we did. He is now recovering nicely, even though the benign tumor was 6 pounds in weight and almost 10% of his body weight and attached to his spleen. So, we'll bring him home tomorrow and see how he does. My point of view about all this is that he is already pretty old for a big dog but this might increase his remaining quality of life. Every time my son comes home from college he tells me that he doesn't expect Furby to be there each time he leaves. I think this is a way to emotionally cope with the potential loss of an old family friend.

Furby has been very special and definitely a member of the family since the beginning. He also trained our newer Corgi (now 5 years old) to fetch in the forests and on the beach when we walk them nearby our home on the coast of Northern California.

So, so far our old friend is still alive and coming home tomorrow from his latest experience.