Category Archives: Pet Care

A Week of Doctors and Veterinarians

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This week I had an appointment with my gynecological oncologist, Dr. Sunshine, as well as my normal monitoring appointments. (When doing chemotherapy, you get a lot of blood drawn – not as much as during IVF, but close.) I also had to take my poor, itching (from allergies) pekingese to the veterinarian.

Dr. Sunshine had to inform me that I have to stay on pain killers until after chemo because with the nature of the chemo I have, it is just too hard to try and wean off of them until after I am done with my last two chemos. I am on the lowest possible dose, but I still don’t like it. He answered a bunch of questions we had had that only he could really answer – if there were answers. Overall, it was a good appointment even if we did wait two hours to see him. (Practicing out of 11 hospitals means you are a very busy man.) I did chide him about not having anything for Ovarian Cancer Awareness month. (My post is coming for this after Labor Day.)

My poor pekingese! Not only is he itching up a storm, he has developed a bad urinary tract infection with bladder stones. I nearly broke down in tears at the vet’s office when she told us he needed surgery. DH and I don’t want him to go into surgery until his itching and scratching are under control. He has been waking us up in the wee hours of the morning scratching his back and barking in frustration as a very itchy dog will do.

Here is the problem, benadryl does nothing for my pekingese. In the past we have always had to put him on steroids for about two weeks every year. Since it was such a limited time, we didn’t feel he needed shots or such. My mother’s peke is going to start allergy shots, so it isn’t like we wouldn’t do it if we thought it was necessary. While I was in the hospital, SMR developed his urinary tract infection and we had to take him off the steroids and on antibiotics. This meant his itching came back with a vengeance.

Oh, did I mention that to prevent itching means minimizing his time outside while keeping his stones under control until surgery means having him out to pee as often as possible?

Now, the vet finally told us it is ok to give him loratadine for allergies. This seems to be working better for his itching than anything less than steroids has ever.

This was supposed to have been DH’s vacation week and we spent 7 hours in various doc’s offices. Some vacation, huh?

Cleveland, Tennessee NOT Pet–Friendly

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Cleveland, Ohio is a better bet for a hotel.

Working backwards, when told our little pekingese caused no damage and we wanted our 50 USD deposit back, the clerk’s reaction was to say “dammit” – and it was a serious dammit. He thought it was under his breath. I got news buddy, I’m reporting you to AAA for false advertising.

First, there was the signage:

IMG 1584

Now, most of the hotels in Cleveland, Tennessee claimed the same, but they all wanted exorbitant deposits and an extra 10 to 20 USD per day even when the pet caused no damage. The common fee was 100 USD – a bit much for a small pekingese.

Now, we were tired – having driven 600 miles and it was almost 2 AM when we reached Cleveland. What can I say? I tend to get late starts I’m not much for mornings.

We found the Travel Inn – their fee was 50 USD plus 15 USD a day – not unreasonable. The kicker? Where you had to walk your dog – under threat – despite the sign shown above of being “Pet Friendly”. Here’s a movie to show where this location was:

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Oh, and the other thing? The “pet friendly” walk was not even human friendly – lookie at what we found there:

IMG 1591Of course, there was also broken glass in case you didn’t find the condom.

I highly recommend avoiding Cleveland, Tennessee when stopping over on long car trips.

I have stayed at truly pet-friendly places. This is not one!

DH is no longer allowed to select hotels while traveling. He becomes super grump and unreasonable late at night. Since I am a night person, I would like him to let me take over driving before he iis ready to fall over. Of course, his theory is that he shoulld drive until he collapses – thus making him too grumpy to trade places.

A Poorly Pekinese

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Last week Thursday, Mr. Smokey, a.k.a. SMR had dental surgery. The vet took 4 teeth. Three of these teeth were rotten to the point of periondontal disease. One of the teeth was broken – due to SMR being a bit of a scrapper – such that only root was left.Just Coming Home from Vet Dental Surgery

As you can see from the picture, he was completely out of it when he came home. SMR thought he could walk. I did find out that my husband is even more of a worry wart than I expected as he would not let go of Smokey for about 4 hours after we brought him home. Smokey on his bed

I finally got him to let the poor little dog lie down in his own bed – where he did not move for all evening. We had to pick him up to take him out.

Now, my husband decided to sleep on a mattress we have on the floor in one room with Smokey so he wouldn’t fall off the bed.  As you can see in the picture, he was keeping his mouth hanging in the air.  I can’t blame him as I have had major dental surgery and it is no fun at all.

So, not only was I sick last week, I had a poorly little pekingese to take care of all weekend.  And he needed a lot of attention because he is very, very good at not taking  medicine.  For instance, he held a pill that had been hidden in a raspberry, which he usually snarfs up, in his mouth for a full 15 minutes before spitting it out.  Now, I have had many pekes, and know this can happen, needless to say, my husband was the victim of this since Smokey is his first dog – let alone pekingese.  My philosophy of making a peke take a pill is to place it in the back of their throat and rub their throat to swallow.  I know it sounds cruel, but I think the pain would have been crueler.

Now, Smokey is doing pretty well, there is no more swelling, and I think he is feeling better than he had been before the surgery.  Of course, he will continue playing the “poorly pekingese” card as long as he is allowed to.

Pet Food Recall and the Industrialization of Our Food Supply

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Kansas.

Kansas is the place where the problem originated. Kansas is also the place where mega-farms were born. Supposedly, the FDA is hot on the trail of the problem:

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2007/03/20/national/main2587087.shtml

Kansas is supposed to be the fresh-faced picture of Dorothy from the Wizard of Oz. Of course, Kansas is also part and parcel of Monsanto and ADM – even if only higher up on the food chain.

The FDA believes that the gluten was actually contaminated by toxic substances still unknown. Shouldn’t they be testing the contaminated foods and doing a trace back of these? Granted, I’m not a chemist by any means, but it seems that there should, indeed, be a way to find out.

Who would willingly and knowingly send poisonous food to our pets? It seems that Menu Foods, Inc. would. And did. According to a variety of news sources there seems to have been at least a 30 day lag between noticing a problem and notifying anyone. 30 days of inaction. 3o days where pets could – and did – die.

How did this happen? Those who are familiar with me know that I believe the centralization and deregulation of the food industry has led to the endangerment of lives. Not only our pets’, but our own.