Erez,
Thanks for the thoughts. Yes, I've sometimes wished people were as adaptable (and as sociable) as animals! I've had animals all my life as well, and for awhile we donated our time to an organization that teamed assistance dogs with people with disabilities - it's amazing what dogs can do for and with people in need. In fact, we were raising Austin to be such a dog, but he failed his physical due to loose hips - the fear that arthritis and dysplasia might set in meant he failed out. Ironicly he was going to be a hearing assistance dog! He then became our pet and fortunately none of those other issues have appeared.

He was doing quite fine with the vision loss (to the point that we were largely unaware), initially mostly due to the other dog acting as his guide. He's adapted pretty well to his situation, but the big thing we can see now is that he is no longer in pain - every day he returns a little more to his puppy-like self - happy to be feeling better even if it is a little dark out! I just need to come up with a tennis ball that beeps, he misses fetch as it is real tough to see where the tennis balls go!

The bummer is not catching it earlier. Hopefully the info about this gets out so others can catch it earlier.