Waiting

So, Reyna and I spent a few hours at the vet school this morning. She’s still there, actually, being fed lots and lots of happy drugs so they can do the x-rays. I’m to be there at 4:00 to chat with the surgeon again. Based on information from this morning's exam, best case is a soft tissue injury; worst case is a joint dislocation. I’ll go into more detail this evening, when I have the final results.

Son Of A...

As if the mess with Reyna isn't enough, lets add a case of poison ivy to the fun. So far, its not a huge amount, and only on my knee and face. I just have to remember to NOT SCRATCH. And yes, Mom, I've already bought some Ban roll-on.

Setback

I finally heard from the vet school. Reyna goes in Friday morning for an exam and x-rays. They're thinking its probably a soft tissue injury, which is worse than a pulled muscle but better than anything that requires a surgical fix. She's back on total restrictions at least until Friday, but most likely for a few weeks. The vet suggested I up her Trazadone dose. I think I’ll start taking it, myself…

General Health Update

Best news – the clowder is healthy again. No sneezing cats with goopy eyes. Always a plus.

Good news – the prednisone helped my back enough that I’m going to hold off on the epidural for a while longer. Its not great, but its tolerable, and I can live with that.

Not good news – Reyna limped the entire weekend, with varying degrees of severity. I’ve left a message at the vet school, so hopefully I’ll hear from someone soon.

8 Week Worry

Reyna is 8 weeks post-op today. Officially, she can start having more freedom around the house and yard, but still no wrestling with Duncan. Of course, not being allowed to play rough also means that she still has to be crated when I’m gone and at night. For the most part, though, the most significant restrictions are eased at the 8 week mark. There’s only one snag to this – Reyna’s been a bit mopey during our evening walks lately, so I decided we’d stop the evening walks for a few days, and even take this weekend to just relax. We’ve walked twice a day, every day but one, since she hit the 3 week mark, so I figured it would be okay to take some time off. With this in mind, I walked Reyna a little farther yesterday morning than I have before, just so we’d still come somewhat close to getting the same total distance. She was fine when I left, no limp and feeling pretty peppy, and the sitter said she was fine during her lunch visit. When I got home last night, though, Reyna was limping. For the first time in weeks. The limp had eased somewhat by bedtime, but Reyna was bunny-hopping quite a bit both last night and this morning. With any luck, the limp is due to nothing more than a bit of muscle stiffness, but we’ll definitely be taking things very easy this weekend.

High-Ho, Heigh-Ho, Its Back On Drugs I Go

I went to the doctor about my back this morning. I’ve had a nagging pain for the last many months in and around the spot where I ruptured the disk a few years ago. Over the last couple of months, though, the pain has gotten worse. I’d been doing pretty well, tolerating it as much as possible and not letting it slow me down too much, but then Tuesday evening I started having muscle spasms. Seeing as how I’m the only human in my household, having nearly incapacitating spasms is just not a good thing. On the upside, though, I’m sure someone from work would start to worry when I didn’t show up the next day...

At any rate, the doctor confirmed that the problem is that stupid ruptured disk again, and I very likely have a pinched nerve on the left side (because of the disk and the inflammation). He said that the reason I also have pain on the right side is because the muscles have stiffened up so much that they’re actually inflaming the nerves on that side. Sigh. For now, we’re going to try a non-invasive option – oral steroids. I’ve got a week of prednisone to take, and if there’s no significant improvement, I’m to call the doc next Wednesday. He’s hoping the prednisone will at least help the problem on the right side, if not so much on the left. If there’s no improvement, he’ll send me to someone for a round of epidural shots. I’d prefer to avoid that, if possible, but we’ll just have to see what happens. Doc also gave me hydrocodone to help me get through the next few days, which I definitely appreciate. I took my first hydrocodone right after lunch, and my back already feels so much better. I've said it before, and I'll say it again: drugs are your friend.

And Spreads…

Belle, Loki and Mikey are all over their respective colds, thank goodness. But now Parm and Per’la both have it. Parm’s record is a 17-sneeze fit. Pretty impressive, really. Khar seems to have missed out on the bug so far. If we’re really lucky, this will end with one cycle through the clowder, and not keep hitting the cats over and over.


And speaking of sickness, Duncan has been sick this weekend in a different and much more unpleasant way. I’m hoping its just the heat making him feel icky and he’ll get better as it cools down a bit next week.

Saving For A Rainy Day

As a general rule, I don’t do dog apparel. Especially not for German shepherds. And just to clarify, I don’t consider the worn-once-a-year-for-ten-minutes birthday hat or Christmas kerchief to be dog apparel. I’m talking about actual clothes for dogs. Two weeks ago, though, I broke my own rule. Reyna’s rehab is very important to me, and I don’t want the weather to get in the way. While Reyna may not care if she gets soaking wet in the rain, and I don’t really care if I get soaking wet, I do care about the potential problems of putting a soaking wet dog in a crate and leaving for several hours. You may not realize this, but Reyna is darn near impossible to dry off with a towel. Or even several towels. You think she’s dry, but then she shakes (or spins), and suddenly she’s soaking wet again. That undercoat of hers is useful for many things, including storing large amounts of water. So, to cut down on the amount of wet dog going into a crate after a morning walk in the rain, I decided to buy Reyna a rain coat. Yes, I said it. A rain coat. I found an inexpensive one online, ordered it based on the manufacturer’s specifications, and got it early last week. The neck and girth fit just fine, but it was six inches too short on her back. I called the company I bought it from, spoke to a very nice lady in customer service, and had her measure the length of the next size up. In between me returning the too-short coat and her shipping the new coat, of course, we had those lovely torrential downpours. Reyna’s new coat arrived yesterday afternoon. It’s a bit big around the girth, but I can fix that. The important thing is that its long enough. It also has elastic straps that you’re supposed to slide the rear legs through – they keep the coat from sliding side to side – but I haven’t decided yet if we’ll actually use those. They pull the coat back just far enough to keep it from covering as much of her neck as I’d like. And no, I did not order a coat for Duncan. I don’t think you could put anything on him that would convince him that he wouldn’t actually melt from taking a walk in the rain.



But if you think its wrong for a dog to wear that rain coat, as simple as it is, just remember, I could have gone with something like this: