.

Our dog--fit, spry, 8 year old, who just went to the vet last week and got a clean bill of health--woke up Saturday morning and was unable walk. No illness, no injury, no warning. On Friday night she was able to jump down from a bed three feet off the ground, run down two flights stairs for her midnight piddle and some frolicking in the snow; Saturday morning she could not lift her body without crashing face-first into the floor.

Every second since then has been brutal. Trying to get a 90 pound immobile dog to and from hospitals without a car, on the weekend, in Brooklyn, while we're all in shock. The fear, anxiety, and emotional torture of being totally helpless, having no idea how to comfort or adequately care for our best friend in the world, no way to explain why this is happening to her, why she can't get up, why she's being dragged to horrible places where they muzzle her and poke her and drug her and put her in cages. Two heartbreaking days of her continuing to try to get to her feet, because in the middle of all of this, she wants to protect and care for us.

She's alive, in a hospital in New Jersey awaiting an MRI with a veterinary neurosurgeon. The X-rays, blood tests and physical exams she's had thus far have ruled out virus, infection, and injury; leaving diseases of the spinal cord, or brain.

I will not be blogging for quite some time, if her prognosis is the worst possible, I may not ever. If you are of faith, and it is part of your ritual to pray, I beg you to do so for my family.

Take care.