Abby's Surgery
Abby has to wear the "Cone of Shame"
Abby turned six months old recently. She is turning into a young adult dog (or more like a rebellious teenager). But that means it was time to think about taking her in to the vet to have her female parts removed. We just went through several months with a puppy in out house. That was enough to last me for a long time. No more puppies for us!
Because of her impending surgery, she couldn't eat anything after midnight the day that she was scheduled. I got up in the morning and let her out for her pee break. Afterwards she came in and went straight to her dog food bowl, just like every day. But instead of getting her breakfast I went upstairs. The look on her face was like "Hey!!! Dude!!! You forgot something!!!" Since her appointment was at 8:30, Sandy distracted her by taking her for her morning walk right away. By the time they were done with that, it was almost time for her to go to the vet.
Sandy picked her up late in the afternoon. Good news - the vet said that she did fine in surgery. She was still pretty groggy. The people at the vet's office said she would probably just sleep for the next two days. Well, Abby is a tough little dog. Two hours later she was awake and wanted to play fetch. Stitches? We don't need to be careful about no stinking stitches! Abby was running around, jumping on the couch, and ready to play. Sandy defintitely had her hands full trying to get Abby to tone down her level of activity during the day.
Abby in her Idaho Engineering tshirt
Besides that, it wasn't long before Abby started to lick the stitches on her belly. We responded first by putting a tshirt on her. She looked really stylin' in her "Idaho Engineering" tshirt. That helped to keep her wound from getting dirty, especially when she went out for a walk, but didn't stop her from licking it. When we put her in her pen at night (we don't trust her to run around loose all night) she would lick it till it started to bleed. After a week Sandy had to take her back to the vet to have her stitches redone. Then there was no alternative. We had to do the "Cone of Shame".
First we tried an inflatable collar. The one we had didn't fit well and Abby would have nothing to do with it. I got her a smaller one but she still didn't like it. Finally Sandy got her the old-fashioned, plastic cone. She didn't like having it put on, but once it was on she was pretty calm about it. That's Abby - she pretty much goes with the flow.
Abby's not happy but is resigned to wearing her collar
Abby was definitely a good sport. For almost two weeks she wore her tshirts. It must have itched because she would walk so that her side rubbed against the wall. She even put up with the cone. Some dogs might have gone into fits with it on but she just went about her business.
After two weeks her wounds from the surgery had finally healed. She has quite a scar, but who cares. It's on her belly, and will be covered by fur in a month or two anyway. And Abby is more like a hockey player than a fashion model. If she was a human she would probably be proud of her scar.
