Poorly Sickly Dog
When we first adopted Reggie, she was overweight by some 20lbs. She didn't get much exercise, lived most of life in her crate (cage), and had a reputation for being bad with children. She also seemed to be scared of men a little bit, often shying away from me.
With much loving care and attention and copious walking (4 times daily) mostly with Lorraine, she had slimmed down to just over 90lbs, recovered from her general fear of men and showed no signs of any issues with children, babies, or pretty much anyone. She is not the most sociable with other dogs admittedly, despite her frequent trips to the doggie park.
One of her favourite things when I get home is to stand up on her hind legs, with her front legs on my lap getting some attention and hugs, something she was not strong enough to do when we first had her.
All in all she is a happy dog, her coat much improved, weight is better, fitness too, although stamina continues to be a stretch for her. We are looking forward to raising our forthcoming child with a dog as a companion, and we know she will do an awesome job.
However, poor Reggie has been under the weather of late. A couple of weeks ago, whilst fortunately I was working from home, Reggie hurt herself. Thinking she is a spring chicken (she's 6.5yrs) she continually chases anything that moves, rabbits, squirrels, birds, leaves, etc. Lorraine came back from walking her, on her own.
Reggie had chased a rabbit, and done something to hurt herself. She was unable to walk very easily and so Lorraine had left her in the park. I went over to find her limping badly, although with no noticeable injury either in the paw, pads or the joints. Thinking she had just pulled something we took her into the vet the next day for a check up and some anti inflammatory drugs, only to be told she had torn her ACL, and would need surgery.
We took her back the following Monday and left her overnight for the procedure. She came back a day later with a lampshade on her head, and stitches in her leg, feeling sorry for herself. Limping, and bumping into everything with her new rain catcher/satellite dish. The rest of that week seemed to go well, apart from me having to carry her up and down the stairs!
On the Friday she started to get sick, the vet said it was a reaction to the pain medication. Over the course of the weekend she threw up 8 times, with little or no warning, and no discernible pattern.
The next two weeks are a bit of a blur of carpet cleaning, almost daily trips to the vet for drugs, check ups, refixing the stitches, more drugs, daily suppositories, injections, pills, more cleaning, carpet stain remover, and so it goes on. I was definitely not popular as I had two business trips in that period too. Reggie has lost almost 10lbs.
She will finally get her stitches out tomorrow, a week later than was supposed to be thanks to her biting some of them out during a coneless period. We are still trying to get through more than 48 hours with no sickness, but it has definitely slowed down. At this point, we are not sure if it is a medical issue, or a psychosomatic issue with her from all of the stress, but it will be nice to have our fit, healthy, calm Reggie back again, before the baby comes and turns our world upside down all over again!
With much loving care and attention and copious walking (4 times daily) mostly with Lorraine, she had slimmed down to just over 90lbs, recovered from her general fear of men and showed no signs of any issues with children, babies, or pretty much anyone. She is not the most sociable with other dogs admittedly, despite her frequent trips to the doggie park.One of her favourite things when I get home is to stand up on her hind legs, with her front legs on my lap getting some attention and hugs, something she was not strong enough to do when we first had her.
All in all she is a happy dog, her coat much improved, weight is better, fitness too, although stamina continues to be a stretch for her. We are looking forward to raising our forthcoming child with a dog as a companion, and we know she will do an awesome job.However, poor Reggie has been under the weather of late. A couple of weeks ago, whilst fortunately I was working from home, Reggie hurt herself. Thinking she is a spring chicken (she's 6.5yrs) she continually chases anything that moves, rabbits, squirrels, birds, leaves, etc. Lorraine came back from walking her, on her own.
Reggie had chased a rabbit, and done something to hurt herself. She was unable to walk very easily and so Lorraine had left her in the park. I went over to find her limping badly, although with no noticeable injury either in the paw, pads or the joints. Thinking she had just pulled something we took her into the vet the next day for a check up and some anti inflammatory drugs, only to be told she had torn her ACL, and would need surgery.
We took her back the following Monday and left her overnight for the procedure. She came back a day later with a lampshade on her head, and stitches in her leg, feeling sorry for herself. Limping, and bumping into everything with her new rain catcher/satellite dish. The rest of that week seemed to go well, apart from me having to carry her up and down the stairs!On the Friday she started to get sick, the vet said it was a reaction to the pain medication. Over the course of the weekend she threw up 8 times, with little or no warning, and no discernible pattern.
The next two weeks are a bit of a blur of carpet cleaning, almost daily trips to the vet for drugs, check ups, refixing the stitches, more drugs, daily suppositories, injections, pills, more cleaning, carpet stain remover, and so it goes on. I was definitely not popular as I had two business trips in that period too. Reggie has lost almost 10lbs.
She will finally get her stitches out tomorrow, a week later than was supposed to be thanks to her biting some of them out during a coneless period. We are still trying to get through more than 48 hours with no sickness, but it has definitely slowed down. At this point, we are not sure if it is a medical issue, or a psychosomatic issue with her from all of the stress, but it will be nice to have our fit, healthy, calm Reggie back again, before the baby comes and turns our world upside down all over again!
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