Behind The Green Door

On the heels of our trip to Puerto Rico, Satchmo hasn't been doing that well. For the past year or so he has aged really quickly, and a few weeks ago he collapsed. It's not as dramatic as it sounds though - I came home, he woke up and got really excited, and then just sort of fainted. He was down for about a minute and when he came to just seemed to walk it off. We took him to the vet anyway, and instead of finding out why he passed out they found a tumor on his spleen about the size of a peach. To add insult to injury, this seemed to have nothing to do with his collapse, and now we had two problems to figure out.
Since then we has been back and forth from different vets, and some of the news has been better than we expected. The tumor which at first they thought could burst at any moment, seems to be stable at the moment, and even though it needs to be removed doesn't seem like the sort of thing that is immediately life threatening.
Today Satchmo and I went to the cardiologist to see if we could figure out the deal with the fainting, and after he had an ultrasound we found out that one of the reasons might have been the fact that he has pulmonary hypertension. Which, to be honest, sort of pissed me off. Granted, I don't have the hardest life, but I'm stressed. Kids, work, money, life in general - you name it, and I'm stressed about it. Satchmo, on the other hand, has to decide which room to fart in... and that's pretty much it. On top of that, the way you treat pulmonary hypertension in dogs is by giving them Viagra.
Seriously. And now I'm really pissed. You know what good drugs I get? Nothin. I'm creeping up on forty and have new and surprising ailments all the time, and you know the kind of things my doctor suggests? Fish oil. But Satchmo passes out and he gets Viagra - and not only that, but there is a pharmacy in New Jersey that makes Viagra in a liquid form with beef flavoring! Fuck. I wouldn't be surprised at all if his post surgery treatment included bacon flavored cocaine... but god forbid I have a heart attack or something, I'll probably get a brussels sprout salve.
On the positive side, I'm sure his social life will improve. Plus, we might be able to make some extra money by letting him do some porn. Seriously, he's pretty cute, and since he won't be hindered by any sort of moral code, I think he might really enjoy it. I already have a mental list of porn movie titles going...