Conehead of Doom

Or: Reason #87,482 why we can't have nice things.

By now if you haven't seen pictures of my pup, you live under a rock [I assume]. However, you may or may not be familiar with his issue of histiocytomas--beware, some pics get gross. Anyways, it's supposed to be no big deal really, kind of a cross between doggie warts and puppy chicken pox: Once they get one, your dog is supposed to develop an immunity and not grow them again. But some breeds have a tendency or predisposition to keep getting them... and guess what? Cash's genetics are 2 out of 3! Generally they should stop growing around age 2. He'll be two in July, so fingers crossed.

Normally these little wart lookin' thingies will pop up out of nowhere, grow kind of quick, and then disappear. Unless they get irritated. When we first got Cash, they told us that one of his foster-mates had been licking the histio on his back. Even though it was the size of a silver dollar, they said their vet thought it would go away. After about three months of not enough progress, we chose to have it removed. Cash healed fine and dandy. He got one or two small ones [back leg, shoulder, etc] but they all resolved themselves.

Until December. It started out the size of a pencil eraser... but it was on the top of his front paw.  Great. Easy access for puppy spit. It's insanely hard to keep him from licking or chewing things, and his foot was no exception. We went on vacation to see the folks... and by the time we came back the histio was red, irritated, and at least the size of a quarter--probably bigger. The vet agreed we needed to remove it sooner rather than later, because there's not as much saggy stretchy puppy skin on the paws, and he needed to be able to close the incision.

If you aren't familiar with our luck, you'll be surprised to hear that this is actually where the story begins--yeah, seriously.

This is why it's called the Floppy Cone.

Day One, Cash remains doped out of his head and behaves pretty well.
Day Two, Cash starts to be kind of a hassle.
Day Three, Cash chews the bandage completely off while in his crate at night. It was a Saturday morning, so I called the vet and they said to re-bandage it myself since they didn't have any techs or vets available, only office staff. Hindsight, THIS is when I should have stopped in to the Emergency Vet. Halfway through the day, Cash tears my bandage off.
Day Four, Cash tore through another bandage. Day Four and a Half... put booger to bed with a floppy cone. He managed to not only get around it and rip his bandage off in under an hour, but he also began stress licking, and licked out most of his stitches, resulting in a lovely GIANT OPEN WOUND. Thanks buddy!!


So around 11 pm, we take Mr. Genius to the Emergency Vet. Apparently part of the problem is that since I was basically wrapping his foot on my own, I applied too much pressure--which may have caused him irritation which made him want to tear the bandage off. Additionally, his original vet only did one row of sutures--no internal ones. That didn't help. Luckily he only had small traces of infection, understandable since it's on his foot and he's been licking. I felt like a terrible puppy parent.

Still not sure if they used a dollar sign
because his name is Cash or
because he's spending Mama's money.

The Emergency Vet was able to stitch him back together, and sent us home with a giant cone and a prescription for antibiotics. When I picked him up, they asked to see him back in 12 hours, so around 8 pm. The doc was a little concerned, but wanted to leave his foot uncovered so it could heal up faster. He also sent us home with Trazadone... yeah, the anti-anxiety med. Apparently dogs tolerate it really well, and since Genius here can't tell that he is hurt, he needed something to knock him down a peg or two.

So, the Cone of Shame. 24/7. Dear Lord. Where do I even begin? Well, Cash has T-rex arms for one, so the Cone that fits his neck... almost drags the floor. He was never a graceful dog to begin with--but now he gets his face stuck on the door, the wall, the floor, the bed, pretty much everything. Including MY LEG. Repeatedly. And being a) a bully and b) a mama's boy, he has to follow me literally everywhere. No joke, I take two steps to the left, he follows. I get off the bed, he gets off the bed. I turn around, he thinks he still needs to stand in front of me, so he tries to walk around me but jams the cone into my leg instead.

And lucky little jerk that he is... Since he has to be coned 24/7, he can't sleep in his crate. Awesome. That means the dog with ZERO personal space boundaries gets to sleep in the bed with us. And he wasn't trained to sleep at the foot of the bed, no, of course not, because the bed is for cuddles not for sleeping. Nooooope. He has to sleep at least chest high, preferably between Mama and Dada. No joke. The worst part is when he gets uncomfortable and starts to wiggle around... Flopping the giant painful cone in everyone's face. While we're trying to sleep. Yeah.

Honestly though, I am thankful that we are able to afford pet care. It's inconvenient, but at least we are able to take good care of him--and we're starting to think maybe he was put up for adoption because they knew he was going to have reoccurring health problems. So, like always, adopting the broken things, feeding them, giving them love. I'm also extremely thankful that we are in a position to completely supervise him right now... I don't know what other people do when they have problems like this, and both people work? It's like having a baby, I swear... guess we'll be putting off date night and gym time for another week or two until we can trust this goofball on his own again.

But really... how can you stay mad at that doped up face?

Emotions are illogical.

Which is probably why I hate them so much. Also, I hate how they can simultaneously stack, conflict, draw focus, weigh a ton, distract, dove-tail, and of course, meld.

Hubs went in for another surgery yesterday. He is out and doing ok, all things permitted. That makes 3 surgeries in 18 months, if I remember correctly. He should be pro by now. I only worry because every time he goes in, he ends up hitting the ER at least three times after he comes home. Usually in the first couple weeks. Also, we thought he was doing really well last time and had made progress. Turns out, nope, not so much. Doc fused some of his foot-bones together, hoping it would make him stable enough to walk. He was recovering well and the fuse was holding, and it did make his foot more stable, but somehow he still carries the weight on the outside of his foot. 

This means that for some reason, he needs another surgery to fuse other bones? I don’t really understand how that’s going to help, but that’s because I wasn’t there to listen to the doctor this time. He’s back on painkillers, recovering at home. His mom should be up in a few days to help him out. I don’t look forward to the recovery… he had just starting getting out and about alternating crutches and cane. Now we have to go through it all again.

But everything today was compounded by a realization. And here is my attempt to track my train of thought, which tends to jumble and ramble and double-back in on itself. I was logging my recent workouts in a more logical way—a spreadsheet! Oh god do I love spreadsheets—when I realized that I have about two weeks left to lose the last two inches. Now of course logically I knew this. And in fact, I have lost roughly an inch in roughly the last week. Mentally, sure I could look at a calendar and see, “yes, that is roughly fourteen days until weigh ins”… but something about the way it clicked in my head was terrifying and depressing. The voice saying, “jfc, you’ll never manage to do it. You should just give up.” But you see, if I give up now, it’ll be just like everything else I’ve ever [not] done. Stubbornly tough it out until it’s too close to back out, and then give up at the last minute, causing me to fail. I never see things through [okay except maybe college as a whole]. I say dismissively, “well, I don’t want to starve myself!” and “well, I don’t want to work out!” but really, if this shit goes down and I don’t make it… well, skip back to last paragraph and recall that hubs just had surgery. I’ve been working my ass off with minimal results. At least, that’s what I tell myself. I can handle the fact that I weigh almost to the pound what I did when we left WA. That’s not a big deal for me. But thinking about what I’m gonna have to do, what crazy lengths I’m going to have to endure, to make it these next two weeks… to stay in, to be surrounded by people I hate and disrespect, and who treat me like I’m an idiot… but, if I don’t… but it would be SO much easier to come home. Oh god, I would love to. I’m afraid I wouldn’t get a job though. But, if I don’t… how does hubs keep seeing doctors? How do we get by? The thought of mailing home my stuff… conflicting emotions.

I guess put bluntly, I’m tired of waiting to see what’s going to happen. I know it’s all on me. It’s my problem and I have to figure it out. Now, do I continue sitting here eating everything in sight because I feel bad for myself? No, I shouldn’t. Guess I just wanted one last hurrah. But how does spending two hours a day in the gym NOT pay off?! I have feeling discouraged. Discouraged makes me want to give up. Giving up is what makes me fail. constantly failing is what makes me feel discouraged. I wish I could fast-forward to Nov. 13. I also wish I could suck some of the fat out of my butt and put it in my boobs, or redistribute it to my poor butt-less girlfriends. But anyways. None of that is possible.

 

It’s a good thing they issued us these wonderful giant straws in bootcamp, so we can SUCK IT UP. [tee hee, also, it’s in the cow’s butt! So I made a double entendre.]