Scary Beary

Well some of you may or may not already know this story, so I will go ahead and share anyway. Last spring, Bear gave us quite a scare. She started to act VERY lethargic and really calm and just wanted to lay down under our bed and not really interact with us. Then, one day, she threw up in her kennel. Then, she kept throwing up. Then, she stopped going to the bathroom. So, I figured that she had some sort of stomach virus. We went to see Dr. House and he told us that she could have a "bowl obstruction" but that maybe she was just sick. So, we bought some special bland food and tried to get her to eat that. She did eat it, and then threw it up. Then, that Sunday morning, she simply refused to eat. She has NEVER refused to eat, ok? So I knew something was up.

We took her to the emergency vet. They performed a series of barium x-rays and determined that something was in fact blocking her intestinal tract. Bear needed emergency surgery to remove the obstruction. So, we were devastated because 1. Bear was just miserable and now needed to have an operation to remove whatever she swallowed and 2. We knew it would be super expensive. But of course, she is our sweet Beary Loo and we are going to do what she needs done. Here is what Dr. Ray found...



This long thing covered in dog poo is two of Matt's dress socks that I had tied together for her as a toy. I don't know what I was thinking. She had swallowed several things whole since she was a puppy, and her mommy, like a moron, tied these together for her to play with. The knot that is at the top right by her forceps is what kept the socks from passing. The knot got stuck in her small intestine. If we hadn't taken her in that day, the vet says it would have inched its way into her colon and could have killed her.

Anyway, I say all this to tell you that we thought that she did it again. Last Saturday night, she threw up. Last Sunday morning she refused to eat. Her mommy panicked and rushed to the Doggie ER and demanded a barium x-ray series. 12 hours, 18 x-rays and a lot of barium later, we determined that she had eaten a ton of grass and had a ton of gas and that's why she wouldn't eat. What a silly girl. (And I'm talking about her mommy.)


Here she is, happy as a clam, after coming home.