I'm grateful my sick dog is the smallest.

I don't know how I would have handled it if one of the bigger dogs had gotten Valley Fever.  Rags is my littlest fur child at 20 pounds.

This makes it easy to pick him up and put him on the kitchen counter where  I can over power him to force him to take his pills.  I am grateful he fights and fidgets instead of bites.  Size isn't as much of an issue with sharp teeth.

His size makes it possible for me to carry him up the stairs when he doesn't have the energy.  Or to carry him part way around the retention basin when he wants to come, but can't quite make it.

And because he is small, I can stick globs of peanut butter in his mouth to give him some protein on the days when he won't eat.  He's lost 3 of 21 pounds in 2 weeks.  That's almost 15% of his body weight. 

This morning was another not eating day.  I was able to force feed him some liquid food with a syringe.  It was messy.  I don't hold him so tightly that I hurt him.  But I did get some food into him.  Onto him, onto the counter, onto me.

If it had been either the 40 or 70 pound dog that got sick and they resisted as Rags has, I don't think I would come out the victor.