Jesse Bear Brown

A fun afternoon with wonderful Jesse at the Purgatory Creek wetlands.

Off to a New Vet

It's hard to believe, but since I posted last, Jesse's health has been at the bottom of a totem pole of egos, mainly that of his now ex-primary vet. She was not the one who referred us to Dr. Churchill at the U; that was done by Jesse's holistic vet, the wonderful Dr. Heather Evans. So his regular vet, who seemed upset at Jesse for becoming unregulated and at me for looking outside the box to find him help, disdained making an effort to return Dr. Churchill's calls. Dr. Churchill, on the other hand, sees hundreds of patients, and has a huge work load. Needless to say, when I figured out what was going on, I decided to transfer Jesse out of that clinic and to a new one close to home. However, even doing that has been fraught with challenges. His old vet disdained to fax his record, and after repeated requests, I finally found someone who did fax them to the new vet. Now he has all the information from the U and the old vet, and we will be meeting with him tomorrow. Meanwhile, Jesse's diabetes has been unregulated during this time. He is, however, thoroughly enjoying his people-food diet, curtesy of Dr. C and the U, so I am hopeful that it is helping him to metabolize his food and insulin more effectively. We'll see.

Churchill and Polly

Jesse at the U of M Vets

Our beatiful Border Collie-Black Lab mix, Jesse, was diagnosed with diabetes three years ago. Maintaining his health and energy is a constant challenge. Fortunately, he loves to be outside, and he loves the cold. However, summer and heat present challenges.

This spring he developed something of an appetite. His fructosamine checks showed him to be just out of the 'good' range for his diabetes maintenance. So it seemed a good time to follow up on a suggestion made by his holistic vet, Dr. Heather Evans, which was to check in with a nutritionist at the U of M Hospitals, named, ironically, Dr. Julie Churchill.l

So last week Jesse and Polly spent an afternoon at their beautiful campus, adjascent to the State Fairgrounds. A team of student vets, plus Dr. C and a tech, took down detailed information on Jesse and his eating habits, while Jesse cowered in a corner, overwhelmed, it would seem, by the number of coats in the room.

Nonetheless, he accorded himself very well when asked to do a blood test -- even though he was exhausted from the exam and long discussion process, he hopped up and jogged out of the room. He seemed to realize that all this was being done for his benefit.

Now there are more questions to be answered, and a day-long glucose curve test to be given by his regular vet, Dr. Bruehl, at North St. Paul Animal Hospital. Subsequent to that, Dr. Churchill and her team will give an analysis of what they believe the best diet would be for Jesse and how to best administer it.

For Dear Murphy

My sister's dog, Murphy, who was an amazing Golden Retriever with a great sense of humour, was diagnosed with cancer last month and had to be put down. It was a terrible shock to her and to all of us, as he seemed to be full of life and have many healthy years ahead of him.

We must cherish our companion pets each day, as we have no knowledge of how much time we have left with them.

Now Lamb Chop is with me

After nineteen years and three months of outrageous living, Lamb Chop succumbed to a reaction after having two teeth pulled, one of which was infected. He had managed to live his entire life without a day of illness, but this was simply overwhelming to him. He died in Polly's arms, while waiting for the vet to administer a final shot to him. He spent his last night with Polly, going pee while she held him up, drinking water, though his tongue didn't move properly, and allowing himself to be snuggled and held. He was loving and thoughtful up to the end. Polly and Donner are still adjusting to his being gone, over two months from that beautiful, sunny October morning.

Now Polly has renamed our star -- it is Sirius, Churchill and Lamb Chop, and she looks up to find it every night the stars are out. It appears over the horizon late in the evening, long after the three stars from Orian's belt peer out.

People take a while to recover

It's been over a year now since I left this level of living on earth with Polly and Lamb Chop. Polly still talks to me at least once a day, and calls out to me when Sirius (now renamed after me as Sirius-Churchill) blazes its blue light into the night sky. She kisses my pictures at night and touches my ashes in the small white urn; ceramic, because it breathes.

There is now another family member -- Jesse, a 50-pound Lab-Border collie mix who is pitch black with dark brown eyes. He has always been a part of our family as his family lived with us for a while. Now Jesse has diabetes and is a challenge to care for, for ordinary people, anyhow. But I nudged Polly a bit and reminded her that because of all the care she had given me she knew exactly how to take care of Jesse, and she wouldn't be afraid of the ups and downs of dealing with diabetes. And I was right. She begged to keep Jesse, and it worked.

Now Jesse is busy herding Lamb Chop and the other neighborhood dogs, and makes sure Polly has three or four long runs a day, as he needs lots of exercise. They go up and around all the paths that we used to take, through the woods and grass. Sometimes she talks to me then, as well.

Lesson from an Apricot Miniature Poodle - Churchill McElwain-Brown

My dog Churchill McElwain-Brown, who died at Christmastime this year, was 17 years and one month. He had dealt with chronic health issues for the last two years of his life. He was blessed not only with a good regular vet, but with a great holistic vet (Dr. Evans of Minneapolis), as well as an amazing pet psychic (Bonnie Illias of Hinkly, MN). I have learned so many lessons from my experiences with Churchill that I feel compelled to blog them, in hopes that others may benefit as well, and learn from my mistakes.

The first think I would like to say is that I have learned from Churchill, who was engaged in the art of living in the present until he could no longer hold on, is to do just that -- to sink oneself into the present, to immerse onself completely in the moment. Whether we are feeling good or not, we can do that. We can breathe, see, hear, feel and experience those around us, as well as the joy of nature and the season, and the day's weather, whatever that may be.

We can simply be. We can be victorious by just doing that.

So this blog is dedicated to the wisdom (Tao) of Churchill, from his viewpoint.



Pamela "Polly" McElwain-Brown
Minneapolis, Minnesota USA