It takes a lot to slow down Nicole Davilli, but hearing “I don’t want to have to tell you this” and “brain tumor” from the veterinary neurologist froze her.
She struggled to digest the explanation behind her dog’s recent seizures.
Darby, a Boston Terrier, might live a few months, the vet told Davilli. Even six.
This can’t be the way her story ends, Davilli thought once back in her home in Virginia Beach.
Because Darby isn’t an ordinary Boston Terrier. Darby is family to Davilli and her husband, Todd Bohlke, and an agility champion, having reached heights most in the world of dog sports only dream about.
Girl on Fire is her nickname. Four legs of fierce. Darby is a fighter and a winner.
Maybe that’s why the cancer is gone.
Eight months since receiving the grim prognosis, Davilli will host Thanksgiving at a pet-friendly Outer Banks beach house where Darby will be underfoot.
“Our journey together wasn’t ready to be over,” said Davilli, who will let Darby feast on turkey, mashed potatoes, cheese broccoli, butternut squash and “whatever she wants” this week.
While news like that doesn’t need a cherry on top, two weeks ago, Davilli and Darby notched the Oscar, Pulitzer, and the Nobel Prize of agility. Darby is an American Kennel Club Agility Grand Champion, a lifetime achievement award met through stringent criteria.
“Surreal,” Davilli said. “Through blood, sweat and a lot of tears, I never stopped believing in her.”
After Darby’s diagnosis, Davilli studied the image of the tumor.
“It looked to me like it was taking up a lot of the right side of her skull,” said Davilli, an architect and something of a rock star in the agility world. “The tumor was 2.7 centimeters and compressing her brain.”
A beginner class with her first Boston Terrier, Abbey, at Chesapeake’s Family Dog Club introduced Davilli to agility in 1999. She was immediately hooked by a sport that rewards speed, precision and strategy while strengthening the bond between handler and dog.
Soon Davilli added Casey, another tuxedo-colored Boston Terrier that, while not atypical in agility anymore, is far less common than breeds like a Border Collie. She coined the name Team #BostonStrong for her pack, a nod to her Massachusetts roots in addition to the breed.
When Casey’s brother sired a litter, Davilli wanted one more, a girl, and out of five babies, one was female. Registered with AKC as Riot’s Dance with Dragons, Davilli named her Darby.
Abbey was good at agility, Casey was great, but Darby was special.
“She loves the game more than I do,” Davilli said. They advanced in the sport quickly, earning four AKC Master Agility Championships in addition to reaching the finals of Westminster Agility twice.
Darby has wheels and drive. Davilli, who competes barefoot with a ballcap and a big voice, embraces the work ethic behind making something difficult look easy. In the ring, they’re a mesmerizing blur of speed and connection.
Davilli planned to compete with her pup well into the dog’s teens until the morning she heard an unusual noise while working from home.
Darby was seizing.
“It was pretty violent and really, really bad,” Davilli said. “My Abbey had seizures, too, and they were hard to watch, but this was horrible. I thought she stopped breathing.”
Initial bloodwork showed nothing, leading Davilli to a veterinary neurologist in Richmond who found the tumor with an MRI.
There were too many tears to wipe away, yet Davilli’s mind percolated.
“Darby has been a fighter her whole life, and I’ve never been a quitter,” she said. “I knew she deserved better than just letting her slip away. I knew she had the heart and soul to fight.”
The agility community is a tight network, and Davilli had met veterinarian Dara Kraitchman, director of The Center for Image-Guided Animal Therapy at Johns Hopkins at a trial. Kraitchman once mentioned starting a research trial for dogs with brain cancer.
That study had ended, but some funding remained, and Darby qualified for it. That didn’t mean she would survive treatment – five days of in-hospital radiation in addition to oral chemotherapy – but doing something offered hope.
Last April, Davilli dropped Darby every morning at the center in Baltimore and picked her up in the evening to spend the night in a hotel. Her second day of treatment, Darby suffered another seizure.
“They assessed her and said she was OK to keep going,” Davilli said.
The pair returned to Virginia Beach for recovery and waited.
Darby has never been a snuggler. Davilli once described her relationship with her top dog as almost all business. The illness changed that. Darby softened along with Davilli.
“I started taking time every day to take an off-leash walk with her and just listen,” Davilli said. “Darby’s always lived pretty high – sockeye salmon and sirloin steak. She has a tug she loves to play with, and I took the time to do that even if I didn’t have the time. I committed to being present for her every day.”
Darby wasn’t quite as steady or as fast, but her agility skills remained sharp. “I never pulled her from a single event,” Davilli said. “We did everything we were scheduled to do.”
Still, Davilli braced for the results when returning to Baltimore in July for the first MRI post-treatment.
She froze like she did when Darby was diagnosed upon hearing there was “no sign of a tumor.” She actually called Kraitchman from the parking garage to ask her to repeat it.
“It’s gone, Nicole. It’s completely gone,” Kraitchman reaffirmed, adding, “Her MRI is unremarkable.”
And that's remarkable.
An Agility Grand Championship requires 450 qualifying scores at master level in various classes.
By September, Darby, 9 years old, had amassed 449 qualifying scores toward AKC’s most prestigious agility award, needing one more on a Premier Standard course to become the fourth Boston Terrier to attain the milestone.
Most handlers competing in AKC would agree that Premier Standard is the most challenging class, requiring dog and handler to navigate wicked angles, pushes to the backside of jumps and often an unorthodox weave pole entry.
Dogs use peripheral vision to read body cues on a course, and one late shoulder turn, one misstep or one momentary distraction, can lead to a fault. That means no qualifying score, or master Q. It’s like needing to get an A+ every time
Trial after trial, the smallest of hiccups prevented Davilli and Darby from reaching the goal.
After not qualifying for the ninth consecutive time on Nov. 15 at a Richmond event, Davilli and Darby made a whirlwind four-hour trek to try again the next day in Oak Ridge, North Carolina.
In 45.62 seconds of magic, they became Agility Grand Champions.
Davilli exhaled into a jubilant scream at the finish, hugged the judge, scooped up her best girl for hugs and kisses and posed with a ribbon nearly as tall as her petite frame.
“I was just ecstatic to have one more day with her as a champion,” said Davilli, who fed Darby cheeseburgers in the park afterward.
Gratitude is an understatement for how she feels this Thanksgiving.
“Don’t let anyone tell you there is no hope. Never forget who you are and never give up. Be thankful every day and appreciate what you’ve got,” Davilli said. “I didn’t think I would spend another holiday with her. I cherish every moment, take every photo and make every memory I can.”
