Right before Christmas I bought a puppy. Total whim, I went with some friends when they were buying theirs (after encouraging them to adopt, no less) and I have no willpower so bought one when he looked at me with puppy dog eyes. I had been looking to adopt a young-ish small flat-faced dog since my pug died early last year with no luck at all.
Last week my little guy was going down two steps and he screams before hitting the ground, and continued to scream every time he moved. It was late so I called the vet, they said bring him in the morning and it ended up being a broken elbow. I feel a bit guilty about not going to an animal ER, but my vet said they would have just done X-rays and left him there overnight anyway. As long as I could make him comfortable and calm at home.
Freak accident, and the break happened in such a way that it affected his growth plate. I watched it happen, and it's hard to say what he did - but the vets think he hanged his arm on the nose of the step. A surgeon had to be called in (he flies his own helicopter from vet to vet to vet) and he was unsure if he could even do the operation, but he was able to and said he was happy with it.
Had he not been able to do it, it would have meant amputation. And because the rotund little football-like stature of his breed, and being his front leg, it would not have worked out for him and probably meant being put down.
So I opted for the surgery, it was a no-brainer because he's part of the family now, and I wanted to give him a chance. A screw and a plate in his front arm, three day overnight at the vet. He has to stay in a cage a few inches bigger than him for 3-4 weeks, except when going pee and then I have to hold him with a belly band. I could also carry him around, but he squirms like mad.
Fast forward a week, and he rarely stops barking. Not from pain, but I suspect boredom. He only stops when I get down on the ground, open the cage door and play with him, trying to mix up which toy we play with, what we play. Snack games, he goes through about 1/4 cantaloupe, 1/2 cucumber, and 2 carrots every day. He's a four month old puppy, and just wants to do puppy things.
The vet gave me some tranquillizers that are supposed to work 12 hours at a time, but they calm him down for only 3-4 hours.
I keep wondering if it's cruel putting him through this, but as my vet & surgeon say, he has a 90% recovery chance and this is only a small sliver of his life. But my god, when I have to close that cage door again and his crying/screaming starts up it kills me each time.
Anyway...... more of a diary entry here than anything. Here's my good boy, Henri. Gets his stitches out on March 4, they'll do some more x-rays then to see how he's coming along.
