Worried in the Possum Kingdom
One day last week, Maggie started to limp a bit when I was walking her. Now, the weather had turned cold very suddenly, and at first I thought it was her back acting up a bit. However, I realized soon enough that it was something else.
When I looked closely at her left hind foot, I saw that she had a large, red swelling on one of her pads. It looked like something that needed to go to the Vet, so off we went to our wonderful vet, Dr. Un-Ren in Lavelanet. He thought it was a cyst and put some ointment of some kind on it, bandaged it up and gave her a shot of cortisone. We were told to bring her back yesterday.
Although the cortisone did take some of the swelling down, unfortunately the "thing" was still there, so he decided to remove it. I didn't want him to give her anesthesia yesterday, because she had eaten breakfast (the cortisone always makes her ravenous; I hate the stuff), so we decided to bring her back this morning after a night of no food.
He gave her a shot of something that knocked her out but didn't seem to send her completely unconscious; it kind of reminds of when they give you a demerol-versed cocktail for small human surgical procedures.
The "thing" does not appear to be cancer, thank goodness (been there, done that, have the t-shirt) and was some type of superficial skin growth.
Surgery seems to be much more casual here than I'm used to; in that you can actually see them performing surgery in one consultation room while you're in the other. I suppose that's one of those differences between a big, fancy vet clinic in L.A. and being out in a rural community. Still, I know many people who credit Dr. Un-Ren with saving the lives of their pets and he really seems to know his stuff.
After her surgery, because the other Vet needed the surgery room, he simply picked her up and carried her to the second examining room where we all sat around and had a fascinating conversation about Dr. Un-Ren's family history in Cambodia and how he came to live in France, while the rest of his family is all over the world. Terrifying to hear about life under the Khmer Rouge from someone who lived it...
Finally, about 30 minutes or so after the surgery, Maggie started to move around a little and we got her out to the car to bring her home. She has been extremely unsteady on her feet ever since and I'm a bit shocked at how hard this whole thing seems to have hit her. I called the Vet's office and was reassured that this is normal, but it appears to me to be taking her longer to recover from this than from the major cancer surgeries that she had back in L.A.
I'm trying not to be a worry wort Pet-mom, but of course that's difficult. I am watching her like a hawk and hoping that a good night's sleep will see her back to her usual Diva self in the morning.
Ciao for now.
Randy
When I looked closely at her left hind foot, I saw that she had a large, red swelling on one of her pads. It looked like something that needed to go to the Vet, so off we went to our wonderful vet, Dr. Un-Ren in Lavelanet. He thought it was a cyst and put some ointment of some kind on it, bandaged it up and gave her a shot of cortisone. We were told to bring her back yesterday.
Although the cortisone did take some of the swelling down, unfortunately the "thing" was still there, so he decided to remove it. I didn't want him to give her anesthesia yesterday, because she had eaten breakfast (the cortisone always makes her ravenous; I hate the stuff), so we decided to bring her back this morning after a night of no food.
He gave her a shot of something that knocked her out but didn't seem to send her completely unconscious; it kind of reminds of when they give you a demerol-versed cocktail for small human surgical procedures.
The "thing" does not appear to be cancer, thank goodness (been there, done that, have the t-shirt) and was some type of superficial skin growth.
Surgery seems to be much more casual here than I'm used to; in that you can actually see them performing surgery in one consultation room while you're in the other. I suppose that's one of those differences between a big, fancy vet clinic in L.A. and being out in a rural community. Still, I know many people who credit Dr. Un-Ren with saving the lives of their pets and he really seems to know his stuff.
After her surgery, because the other Vet needed the surgery room, he simply picked her up and carried her to the second examining room where we all sat around and had a fascinating conversation about Dr. Un-Ren's family history in Cambodia and how he came to live in France, while the rest of his family is all over the world. Terrifying to hear about life under the Khmer Rouge from someone who lived it...
Finally, about 30 minutes or so after the surgery, Maggie started to move around a little and we got her out to the car to bring her home. She has been extremely unsteady on her feet ever since and I'm a bit shocked at how hard this whole thing seems to have hit her. I called the Vet's office and was reassured that this is normal, but it appears to me to be taking her longer to recover from this than from the major cancer surgeries that she had back in L.A.
I'm trying not to be a worry wort Pet-mom, but of course that's difficult. I am watching her like a hawk and hoping that a good night's sleep will see her back to her usual Diva self in the morning.
Ciao for now.
Randy
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