Companions in Crisis Highlight: Zoe Petty

Courtesy of Dorota Petty, Zoe’s mom:

We first met Zoe back in December of 2011 at our annual trip to drop off a food donation at the animal control (Madera County Animal Control, CA). At that time, she was estimated to be approximately 5 and a half months old. After learning that all pit mixes are being put down at 6 months and she is almost at the cut off age – we knew we had to adopt her and save her. Our other dog, Cali (currently 12) immediately fell in love with her and adopted her as a sister. Zoe has been with us through the birth of two kids (including one born prematurely last year) and the big move across the country to Richmond, Virginia.

Zoe is very friendly and social, loves everyone and is really patient with kids. She loves to go on walks, splash in the water and just run around the back yard. Approximately 3 weeks ago, we noticed that she is limping. Knowing her playful personality, we assumed that she just sprained her leg and took her to the vet. On Monday Oct. 29th, 2018 we learned that Zoe has a bone cancer (osteosarcoma) and our life has been put on hold. The cancer diagnosis shocked us, but without hesitation we decided that we want to fight for her. Not only improve the quality of her life, but also prolong it – we want to have more time with her. She sleeps in our kids’ room, she is always greeting us at the door, warning of the mail coming – we are just not ready no give up on her. Even though we have some big expenses coming up (surgery for our preemie on Jan. 18, 2019), we know that we do not want to give up on Zoe. We HAVE to save her again, just like we did back in California 7 years ago.

We are planning on using credit cards and any savings for the diagnostics and the immediate surgery but would appreciate any help with further treatment (chemotherapy) to help offset some of the cost. Zoe is really healthy and still young, we believe that she has many years ahead of her and her prognosis seems promising, as long as we implement the treatment plan as soon as possible.

As a family we are very active and love to participate in various events, we would love to become a voice for FETCH a Cure to help raise awareness and funds to bring hope and support to other families, like ours, who were blindsided by this devastating diagnosis.

Update on Zoe (11/28/18)

Zoe is now 4 weeks, 3 days since her diagnosis; 3 weeks post amputation and 1 week since her 1st round of chemo. We did her blood work this morning and it is just slightly below normal. Hopefully white blood cells count will go back up and we will be cleared for the 2nd round scheduled on Dec. 12th. We’ll be doing a cbc (complete blood count) follow up in a week.