Yes, it’s been a bit of an unpleasant day to be Phoebe, I’m afraid. Her breathing has been a bit wheezy and labored this week, with her coughing fits going from nearly non-existent to regular and unstoppable. It got to the point where we decided to take her in to the vet today. They weren’t going to fit her in until Monday, so I had to tell them that she’s having trouble breathing. So, we came home early from work and took her to her favorite place – NOT! As usual, the assistants were fawning all over her, as they absolutely adore her. The vet listened to various parts of her lungs for a while and then decided to take her back for an x-ray to see how the heart problems have progressed since her last x-ray in November. I hate when they say the words “congestive heart failure.” I know that’s what she has, but it still makes me nearly sick to my stomach. The x-ray showed that her heart has enlarged to the point where it’s literally pushing her trachea up and out of its normal location, which will excite her cough receptors. A portion of her lungs have muted breath sounds through the stethoscope and you could see the line of fluid at the bottom of her chest cavity, which is what muffles the breath sounds. So, they have increased her medications to twice a day in the hope that they will control her heart size (keep it from enlarging further) and reduce the fluid. We also found out that she is having seizures every once in a while. She’s only had 3 or 4 in the past several years, but one of them was last night. That was the first time that Terry’s seen her have one up close, so I encouraged him to ask the vet about it. Based on her symptoms of collapsing, urinating and muscle spasticity, the vet thinks that they are seizures, but doesn’t feel that they are something that should be medicated unless she gets to a point where they are much more frequent. Finally, we had a cyst on her back aspirated to check the contents. It turns out that it’s completely benign and cosmetic, so it’s not causing her any issues, but she’s had it for quite a while and I wanted to have it checked.
So, the poor girl has been poked, prodded, x-rayed, injected, aspirated and just generally worked over. She’s such a good girl, so she didn’t complain a bit. I cried a little bit while they had her in the back for the x-ray, just because I have a tough time being faced with her mortality. The vet really put a good face on it, saying that her body condition is still good, she’s not losing her appetite, she doesn’t seem to be losing muscle mass or anything, she’s just coughing. I just wish I had some idea of how much longer we’ll have her.
I’m back to thinking of getting a second dog before Phoebe leaves us. I just can’t figure out if it’s a good idea or not. Your opinions and experience would be appreciated. I just know that I will not deal with her death well when it’s her time and I don’t know if having another dog to have to take care of will help or hinder. I haven’t really gone through this before, so I don’t know what to expect from myself. Part of me expects to become a hermit in my grief and that I might not want to get another dog for a while, but part of me expects to want to run out and get another dog right away. So, I really don’t know what to do.
Well, anyway, enough of that morose topic. I’ve been stitching on Pretty Posies today, finally. Here I’ve been avoiding it like the plague and now that I’ve gotten back into stitching it, I’m not sure why. I have a game day at a friend’s house on Saturday and I have to work on Sunday, but it’s the kind of work where I can stitch while I’m waiting for jobs to finish, so I expect to have a progress photo after the weekend. I’m just too tired and lazy to take a pic right now, sorry.
And that’s it for me for now. Sorry for the disjointed post, but I’m tired and my stream of consciousness is not necessarily coherent. Thanks for hanging with me. 🙂
