I am presuming this is a stomach virus Murphy caught, but I don’t know for sure. The vet said if he isn’t feeling at least a little better by tomorrow I should bring him in. In the meantime, I am supposed to fast him. This is possibly harder for me than it is for him. I worry that he is going to think I am starving him like the hoarders did. (If mommy had tears, she would be crying right now.)
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Spring is nearly here! Flowers and butterflies will soon be everywhere. Bring some of that springtime joy into your home with this handmade Butterfly Quilt.
This handmade Butterfly Quilt could brighten your guest bedroom with a patchwork look reminiscent of the quilts Grandma used to make. The soft, cozy quilt would welcome your guests and help them to feel at home.
Several months ago my neighbor had to help her little dog cross the Bridge. Since then the woman has been very down without her constant companion. After many prayers and a thorough search of online rescues, she found a pup who looked like a perfect match.
This lady was counting the days – the minutes – until the little dog arrived! She bought sweaters and dishes and cases of food and booties and pet-friendly salt and seatbelts and toys and beds and leashes and harnesses in preparation for the pup’s arrival. This little dog would have wanted for nothing.
On adoption day, though, the new pup slipped her harness and ran away. Within minutes the neighborhood mobilized to help find her. Fliers were put up. Facebook notices were posted. People brought drones with FLIR to help with the search. There were even bloodhounds.
Although there have been several sightings, no one has caught the runaway pup. By today it has been a week, and her chances of being found are not so good. I helped with the search as much as I could. I was out for days checking the creek, looking under sheds and cars, literally beating the bushes to see if I could roust her from a hiding spot, but I found nothing.
I’ve been feeling particularly down this week, and I think it is because of this missing little girl. I was looking forward to getting to know her – to helping discover that all humans aren’t bad. (She was saved from a puppy mill where she produced litter after litter for most of her seven years. At this point she didn’t like or trust humans very much.). I would have been her dog walker, and I was mentally planning the routes we would have covered…the friends we might have made. While she wasn’t my girl, I looked forward to her as if she were.
I told my friend about how I’ve been feeling, and she said that maybe I need to let go. This isn’t a problem I can solve (even though I feel as if it is my fault, that my not-aggressive-enough hunting skills left the dog out in the cold).
I find myself wondering if maybe the little girl dog prayed when she was in captivity. Perhaps her prayers weren’t for a soft bed or a warm house. Maybe she prayed for freedom. Making her own decisions, being her own woman – even if only for short while – may have been more important to her than creature comforts. I like to think that she is (or was) happy breathing fresh air, finding her own food, feeling the rain on her fur. Maybe these things brought her greater joy than our leashed walks ever could.
I just wish it didn’t have to hurt so much.
I thought of her as “Girl Murphy” since they looked similar and shared a Gotcha Day.
Mom’s been hugging me a lot lately. What’s going on?
Cute, funny, stubborn....always the smartest one in the room. If you have a Scottie dog, you can't help but love them. Their shaggy black coats and bright sparkling eyes always bring a smile to your face.
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Toby had another one of his incidents, and family was bitten. I was told, “This dog needs to be put down.” Had it not been the weekend, Toby would likely be gone already. While I absolutely do not want to hurt my puppy, I find it difficult to justify working so hard to keep him with me.
Thinking that it might be my last hours with my boy, I wanted to spend every moment with him. I fed him everything good I had in the fridge. We played his favorite game – Tennis Balls. I took him for as many walks as he wanted. Toby made it harder on me by repeatedly telling me, “I love you. I love you.” (Having a talking dog is not always a good thing.). When I took him out to pee, he insisted on bringing his stuffed dragon with us. When he went to his kennel, he took his stuffed tiger with him and made his bed like he did when he was a tiny puppy organizing the polka-dotted blanket his breeder sent home with him. I cried so much, so hard, thinking of all the ways I had failed my boy I’m surprised I didn’t collapse into dust from dehydration.
For some reason my family thought it odd that I would mourn for the loss of my awful puppy. “But he’s terrible; you should get rid of him”. (True.) “Everyone’s afraid of him”. (I know.) “You could always get a new dog.” (It took me two years to find him! How likely is it that another dog would suddenly plop into my lap?).
In the evening, I took Toby to the church grounds. Even though God is everywhere, it is easier to think of Him hanging around there. I just stood with Toby and prayed the only prayer I could think of: “Help my boy. Help my boy. “
Monday morning I called the vet to discuss what happened and what she thought my options might be. I asked what she would do if he were her dog. Knowing tha Toby has a cyst that won’t heal and how pain reactive he is, she suggeted we go ahead and try surgery to excise the cyst. Perhaps removing the pain from his life might allow him to calm down enough to be able to train with him. She said the choice was mine, though, whether I wanted to destroy him or not.
Toby’s surgery is scheduled for Tuesday. I don’t know how I am going to make it through his recovery since he is so pain reactive. The vet recommended a basket muzzle that allows him to eat and drink. I have been looking into them, but I feel overwhelmed by the different choices and how you need to train your dog to wear one. There isn’t time to get Toby used to one before his surgery. If I put one on him, how long could I keep it on him? How long would he allow it to be on before he figured out how to take it off? I am trying to picture Toby with a cone, it is seems equally dangerous. (Well, for me, anyway.).
While I don’t know how this is going to work out, I am trusting that God will provide what we need at each step. For right now, I am grateful for the two additional days I’ve had with my little boy.
I know he’s scary and dangerous, but this is how I see him with my heart.
Last week I had an appointment with my eye doctor. Unfortunately, the news wasn’t good. What I heard was:
You’re going blind!!
You have cataracts!
The Bell’s Palsy is irritating your eye!
You are diabetic!
Your prescription is off due to your blood sugar!
We can’t replace the lenses in your glasses!
Oh my gosh, did the doctor really say all of those things? No, but that is what I heard.
In reality, the doctor said that although my cataracts are worse than last year, they are still a young person’s cataracts. Also, they really can replace the lenses in my glasses despite me having rimless frames.
The other stuff has me upset, though. It appears that I have developed the familial inherited blindness. When I spoke to the doctor on Tuesday, the she didn’t think I needed to see a specialist about it yet, but after the week I’ve just had, I’m not sure. I plan to call her again this week. (The catch is that she is going out of town for a family situation and won’t be back until mid September.)
After checking my prescription, the eye doctor commented on how drastically different it was from the last time. What I took away from our conversation was that my eyes are acting like those of a diabetic. I had to go home and look up some of the terms she used, and it looks like I have had a number of diabetes symptoms….yet every doctor dismissed me when I talked about them. I am really confused because none of my blood test results ever came back that I have diabetes. Now I am afraid to eat anything. I feel like every carb is a threat.
One can’t help but be upset getting news like this. I know that it is possible that things may never progress or that as the BP improves, my symptoms in general will become less. For now, I fear that I will have another left turn coming up in my future. It seems like I’ve had nothing but left turns. I’ve had so many that I am constantly going in spirals instead of moving forward.
This is so upsetting to me that I can barely type. I find that I use this blog as a way to keep track of incidents, though, so I am making an entry today.
When Toby and I go out these days, I take a can of Halt spray with us because several neighbors have been irresponsible about leaving their dogs out without leashes. One is a pit bull that is aggressive toward other dogs, and I have been afraid of having a run in. Instead we had an encounter with a different little dog that I have written about in the past.
Even though I am very frustrated that this family has been so irresponsible with their dog – to the point of endangering my own – I have tried to be kind. I can see that they adore their little dog, and the dog loves her family deeply. I’ve never said a bad thing about the family, and I have even defended the little dog to others. She is not a bad dog, she is a fearful dog, and her family is doing her no favors by not protecting her with a leash or fence.
When Toby and I got to the corner of the street where the little dog lives, we could see her in her front yard. I looked at Toby and said, ‘Let’s let the little dog enjoy her day outside. We’ll walk a different way.” We turned and went and were already on a different street when the dog saw us and came charging. If you’ve ever been present for a dog attack, you know the circling/growling/biting the aggressor does to disorient her prey. The victim dog has to keep spinning to protect his flank, and when he is turned around and dizzy the aggressor will either head butt him in the ribs to flip him on his back exposing his belly or she will jump on his back and bite him.
Not wanting Toby to be flipped and bitten, I tried to spray between the dogs so the aggressive girl wouldn’t want to come near him. Unfortunately the little girl dog lunged at Toby and got hit in the forehead. I felt so awful. I still feel so awful. I never wanted to hurt anyone. ..not this dog, not her family, nor did I want my own pup hurt.
As I figured would happen in a small community like this one, I am now the town pariah. I am the mean lady that hurts elderly dogs. Somehow folks never noticed the more than dozen times the little girl dog attacked my Toby. Somehow they ignore the other dog walkers in the neighborhood referring to her as “The Bad Dog on X Street” because she chases and bites their dogs. I have watched a neighbor with back problems painfully bend over to scoop up her senior Yorkie to keep her from being attacked yet again by this little girl dog.
Now Toby and I are on everyone’s poopy list, and I have a feeling that if we need help no one will help us or if we accidentally step out of line, everyone is going to be all over us. I feel bad for Toby. I haven’t taken him for a walk since the incident. He misses his friends and his exercise and doesn’t understand what is going on.
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Come visit with Geordie and Toby during happier times. In Dream Our World, they view the world of art from a canine perspective and enjoy a day of unsupervised fun.
It’s funny that even with a worker shortage, I can still find plenty of places willing to say “no” to me.
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Christmas is right around the corner! Make shopping for the men in you life easier by picking up hand knit merino wool sweaters for everyone on your list.
Today I got to experience nerve conduction testing. While not as bad as I was expecting, it still wasn’t much fun. Basically they stick needles into your muscles (while insisting that you remain completely relaxed as they do!) then ask you to flex so that they can check how your nerves and muscles are working. Some times they shock you with electricity (probably mostly for amusement). Where they stabbed me in the back, I developed some colorful goose eggs. I take turmeric, which acts as a blood thinner, so I ended up with cotton ball band-aids all over.
The take away? I can add Lou Gehrig’s Disease to my list of things I don’t have.
Another “you” post? This is getting boring.
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If you have someone in your life who could use a big “Thank You”, consider giving them one of these thoughtful hand-painted hankies. Not only are they reusable and eco-friendly, they are also topical.
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Every year I tell myself that I am going to do a good job of keeping up with paperwork and putting things away. I vow that I will not hoard useless knickknacks or keep every book I meet. January after January somehow finds me buried in paperwork – downing in sentiment.
Toby hates when I get into these cleaning moods because it means less time playing with him. Today he would much rather me be kicking snow for him to catch than doing boring filing and running the dreaded vacuum. I tell him that he should be happy that there will be more room for us to chase tennis balls if he lets me finish my clean up, but I can tell he doesn’t believe me.
I guess I should just be happy that we’re less likely to be
Come with the boys to a place where there are no nasty vacuums – to The Museum of the Imagination! In Dream Our World Bitey and Toby visit the museum of their dreams and look at artwork from a canine perspective.
The Adventures of Bitey Dog 