A Life Renewed
By Mark Preston

Boo Boo is living her best life. The Staffordshire Terrier enjoys walks in her Southern California neighborhood, visits to local dog-friendly restaurants, and the occasional golf cart ride—by far, her favorite activity. It’s a life filled with comfort, love and happiness, far removed from her early years living as a stray on the streets of Mexico, likely abused and certainly forgotten.

Boo Boo’s life changed for the better when she was rescued from those mean streets and taken to a shelter in Calif., where the team there set about tending to the injuries she’d suffered as a stray. Boo Boo lost an eye and had a broken wrist that was never allowed to properly heal. But in California, Boo Boo got the sort of love and care that she’d never before received and, in a particularly delightful twist of fate, also got connected with her forever mom, Beke Lubeach.

Lubeach, the CEO of DOGTV, happened to be visiting the shelter to provide it with the innovative streaming service, designed to calm and comfort dogs, when she saw the recuperating pup. It was love at first sight.

“She had just been there for like a day or two,” recalls Lubeach. “She had just had her eye removed andshe was in a cone and she was limping and filthy and I burst into tears at the sight of her. I was just like, ‘Oh my gosh!’

“The shelter was so crowded, and the people there asked if I’d take her home for a week, just so she could recover with me. And I said OK.”

In just a couple of days, Lubeach and her recuperating charge bonded, and it quickly became clear that one week would become a lifetime. When the shelter asked Lubeach—still just fostering the pup—to take Boo Boo to a local vet to have her injured leg amputated, Lubeach called upon some of her contacts in the industry to review the dog’s X-rays. When word filtered back that amputation might not be necessary, Lubeach adopted Boo Boo, saving her leg and re-shaping her life.

It wasn’t until a few months later that Lubeach learned that in addition to the other medical procedures Boo Boo had undergone at the shelter, she’d also had a tumor removed. “Unbeknownst to me, they’d removed a tumor from her belly,” says Lubeach. “But they never biopsied it at the shelter that night. So they took out an eye, they took a tumor, I didn’t realize any of this. It was all so chaotic and frantic.”

About six months later, Lubeach noticed growths on Boo Boo’s stomach. When she took her to the vet, the diagnosis showed cutaneous hemangiosarcoma, a malignant, highly-aggressive cancer of the blood vessels that manifests as a reddish or purplish-black tumor on the skin. Internally, hemangiosarcoma can be deadly.

“We removed those tumors,” says Lubeach, “but when I took her to an oncologist he said due to her age and the fact that the tumors were external and given everything she had been through he said. ‘Let’s just watch it and not do anything crazy.’ So that’s what we’re doing right now is watching it. She gets checked every six months and they do X-rays. Fortunately, hers [tumors] are external right now. We’re just trying to make sure nothing is out of the ordinary and for now, we’re good.”

A diagnosis of cancer in a pet can be devastating, but Lubeach was better informed and better equipped to handle Boo Boo’s diagnosis and treatment because of her experience with her first dog, Jake. Named after former San Diego Padres’ pitcher Jake Peavy (Lubeach was working with Cox Channel 4 / Padres’ TV at the time) Jake developed an anal gland carcinoma which eventually spread throughout his body.

Jake’s battle was a learning experience for first-time pet owner Lubeach.

“I didn’t know anything,” says Lubeach. “I’d never even had a dog before. But I asked a lot of questions and I learned what I could. Jake underwent about eight different kinds of chemotherapy but he pushed through it all. I wanted to make sure he lived a good life for as long as he lived. I used to take him to work with me and he’d hang out in the TV booth at Padres’ games. He’d wear his [Jake Peavy] jersey and come to the suite and hang out with all of our sponsors. Everybody loved Jake; he was such an old soul. He was actually used as a therapy dog after years of realizing that he was just very special.

“One day, Jake’s trainer asked to borrow him, saying they were going to do some filming. I said ‘Sure, take him, having no idea what they were filming. But they were filming for what is now DOGTV. Shortly after that, when they met me and realized I worked in the media space, I actually left Cox and went to help them launch the channel. That was my entry into the pet space.”

Lubeach utilized her new role to learn all she could about helping her old soul.

“At that point, CBD was just coming out and in the pet space, there really wasn’t a product,” Lubeach says. “But at a pet expo, I met someone who was working on developing CBD treats. He gave me some in powdered form and I’d put it on cheese for Jake, and that’s how he started every day. We also changed his diet and he lived for four years, very, very successfully, when his diagnosis was probably six months. He would go to these veterinary shows with me, and the pharma companies would meet him, and every year he’d come back and they’d marvel at how well he was doing.”

Thanks to a combination of ingredients—not the least of which was love—Jake lived a great and active life, every day of his life. But for Lubeach, the emphasis with Jake—and Boo Boo—is quality of life.

“One day I woke up and Jake was bleeding from his stomach,” recalls Lubeach. “I think it was a spleen tumor that had erupted and I looked at him and said, ‘Okay, that’s it. We knew it was his time, but I was a disaster.”

Now, armed with everything she’s learned, Lubeach is dedicated to ensuring that Boo Boo enjoys the same remarkable quality of life that Jake did. And she’s doing a pretty awesome job of that.

“She’s actually eating fresh dog food now because, I’ll be honest, I used to cook for Jake. I don’t have time to cook anymore. But at least there’s these fresh foods now, which have less chemicals and less preservatives that tend to cause issues. And after she takes a nap, she comes and tells me it’s time to go outside. She loves to sunbathe, which makes me nervous because I know that that can cause some melanoma and she’s prone to that. But it makes her so happy that I’m just like, you know, quality of life. I just always want to do what I can to make sure that these years of her life are the best years of her life.”

Asked for her advice to others who are dealing with a cancer diagnosis in their pet, Lubeach says, “Ask questions and learn what you can. I’m still learning something new every day. I’m very fortunate to be in the industry and be able to ask questions to some very well-informed people. But everyone can ask questions of their vets or pet oncologists. Don’t be afraid to admit that you don’t know what you don’t know.

“Cancer is not always a death sentence for dogs. They do live shorter lives than us, and that’s just a given. But while they’re here with us, the best thing you can do is give them the best quality of life and enjoy their company. That period of time is well worth everything else that comes with it.”

In this period of time, Boo Boo is living her best life.

“Ensuring quality of life is one of our primary focuses at Animal Cancer Foundation (ACF),” says Barbara Cohen, ACF Executive Director. “We are committed to ensuring that all dogs battling cancer can enjoy the same quality of life as Boo Boo. She is an inspiration and a perfect example of why we work to fund research that can provide better understanding, more effective treatments and, hopefully someday soon, a cure.”