Home Sweet Home

Our boy is home!! Doc told us to call this morning and make sure he didn't have a temp, so even though I set my alarm for 7:30 I held off until the assigned 8:30 to call. They told me he was doing "great" and I confirmed that I should come around noon to get him. They close at noon on Saturday and the doc had wanted to keep him until close to that time so they could watch him and keep him rested. She said to come around 11:30, so we showed up promptly at 11:30 on the nose. We got some take home instructions, some antibiotics, paid for the surgery & related costs and she brought him out. OMG. We just had to laugh. Poor Pippin, totally hidden beneath a massive doggy cone. He has loads of personality, and we can look at him and tell when he's pissed. And he was 5 miles past pissed off. In going over his take home instructions she told us they had a cone on him "which he absolutely does not like", followed by a chuckle. She also said "This little booger is already trying to use that leg!!". I think that's probably a good sign, the doc said some dogs refuse to even try to use the leg once it's corrected, since they've gotten so used to 3-legged hoofing.

She handed him over to me and I couldn't even see the poor baby for the huge cone! We loaded up in the car and Brent had to tell me if he was asleep or what he was doing because all I saw was plastic. We came home and took him straight to the backyard to do his business. I set him down and he just dropped his conehead down to the ground and wouldn't even move. He does this same thing if you put him in a costume he doesn't like or a sweater that's too big. It's the classic Pippin "lock and freeze". We took the cone off and he did his business right away. I scooped him back up and gave him his 3 bed options and have been next to him pretty much ever since. For a while he sat up and scratched around on his head where the cone was, and then for a while he just laid in his bed with his eyes open. The doc doesn't give much in the way of painkillers after Day 1 because he does want them to be in a touch of pain, so they don't try too much too soon. That's a great approach with Pippin because he can be very fueled by adrenaline. We can tell he's in some pain, and he sort of grunts around from time to time, but he's fine. He's been snoozing off and on all afternoon and whenever I need a break from sitting in the floor next to him Brent sits with him. I've been catching up on my Tivo-d Oprahs and Racheal Rays! He had one big vomit, but other than that he seems fine. His leg is totally shaved and the whole length of his leg is stapled. It looks incredibly painful and it's tough just to look at it. They remove the staples next Friday. Part of his front leg is shaved from the IV, too.

So, the plan is just to take it easy the rest of the weekend. So far we've managed to escape the torrential floods forecasted. We are supposed to get some storms tomorrow night that are going to take away our wonderful 60+ temps! But who cares, we are going to be sitting here watching the season premiere of 24 in HIGH DEF anyway!!! Brent's been running speaker wires all afternoon to finally get our surround sound up and running. It's going to be strange to hear all the speakers again!

Have a great weekend everyone!
Rachel

WIDTW:
Thurs: 4.25 mile run
Fri: off day
Sat: 50 min Pilates dvd