Black Dog Sunday

Our Black Dog is continuing to seem perfectly healthy and enthusiastic about life since arriving at home. He had fun in the desert but worried us a lot because he was hesitant to walk or run on unknown terrain.

He went to see his ophthalmologist this week. The reason why his vision is waning so fast is that his glaucoma is causing a very big cataract. You can see it in this photo. I did not use a flash. Rather, the cataract glows green even in ambient room light. Due to his glaucoma, he'd probably completely lose his vision if he had surgery to remove the cataract so there is no way to prevent his vision sliding downhill.

The good news is that the pressure within the eye is being completely controlled by the three kinds of eye drops that he gets twice per day. That means that the eye probably doesn't ache. However, I have been surprised to learn that dogs with glaucoma often go blind even when the eye pressure is well controlled by meds.

The amazing thing is how very happy he is. When he knows what lies ahead in terms of terrain, he runs like the wind. In this case, I think that he was following Shyla's tail! It made me smile!

Thanks to all of you who have written to me about how well your blind dogs have done in their home environments - almost making it hard to tell that they are blind. R seems to be similar - the only time that his visual impairment is obvious at home is when I try to hand him a treat. I do have to admit, however, that our LabMobile trips are important to us. We are going to do more research about how we might help our Black Dog to feel more comfortable when we're camping. Just so you know, photo shoots aside, we kept him on leash for most of our desert trip so that we could guide him. It wasn't enough.

To focus on the good, R isn't in pain, and he is living life to the fullest here at home. He still has a bit of vision, and he is using it well. Happy Black Dog Sunday!