Buster Brown 6/11/95 - 6/19/07

Sixteen months ago, during a trip to San Francisco, we found out that Buster was in the first stages of kidney failure. This past weekend, he went through the final stages. This morning, we had put him down.

Lately, he had become unresponsive to his aggressive drug therapy, and was becoming more and more selective about what he would eat. About two weeks ago, he stopped eating entirely. Then he stopped drinking. On Saturday morning, we started him on IV fluids (500 mL under the skin, four times a day) to continue to filter his system. The docs told us that either he would show a remarkable turnaround immediately, showing that he was simply extremely dehydrated and just needed fluids, and would start eating and have more energy... or he wouldn't show any change, which implied that his system was up to something more serious.

Our vets told us, after these last 4 days of his hunger strike and IV fluids, there was nothing else to do.

We greatly appreciate your condolences, but we are not ready to talk about it, since even thinking about it breaks us apart, so please don't call or email quite yet. We know that many of you know Buster, and thought you would want to know.

We are going to miss him. A lot.