Dog Parts -- Tika Up Close and Personal

SUMMARY: Wordless Wednesday

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Health Update and looking ahead to Tuolumne

SUMMARY: Dogs and humans.

Tika's eye: Three days of ointment and the redness had nearly vanished. After the full week's course of three-times-a-day ointment, not only did her eye look good in general, but that weird lump in the inner corner completely vanished. Interesting.

Boost's itching: Itching itching itching. Still using hydroxyzine after checking with the vet that it's OK to do so. If I stop it, she definitely itches more, but it's not so bad either way that I want to use prednisone to knock it out.

Human mom: What a mess! But in some ways, not so bad!

• Left foot (diagnosed as capsulitis in 2nd metatarsal/phalangeal joint): Got a cortisone shot two weeks ago. Made it worse for a couple of days, seems to be typical. Seeing a massage person to work on that by recommendation from some agility folks. I think that's helping; following it up with homework that he gives me to work on it myself. Didn't bother me all weekend except for the rare turn in certain directions, can't quite pin it down. Whole foot, actually both feet, seem sore to pressure, once we went through and evaluated them more carefully. Interesting.
• Lower back: Not good. Sciatic nerve pain comes and goes down right leg and some in left leg, tells me that the disk problems are definitely acting up. But the muscle pain all across the lower to middle back is what's really getting me. Still not sure about whether that's a side-effect of the disk issues or a separate issue. Had no problem running all weekend, but found myself walking carefully because, again, certain twists or movements really hurt. Didn't lift much of anything, ever, and crated out of the car so didn't have to set up or tear down. Monday and Tuesday were miserable indeed.  (As in 2000/2001, sitting is the most painful thing.) On tuesday, doc put me on a short course of prednisone to try to knock out the worst of the inflammation.  MUCH better on Wednesday, although clearly not fixed. Starting physical therapy next week.
• Knees: Well, ha ha, funny knees have felt fine all through this (as long as I don't try something silly like kneeling). I felt good running all weekend, and in class last night I felt great all over, nothing made painful by running at all, even my cardiovascular endurance seemed good which makes no sense given how little exercise I've been getting. But I'm not complaining. Hope it keeps up through this weekend's CPE trial.

I really miss hiking and long walks, I'm realizing. Really really miss it. It's so tempting to just go do them and the foot pain be hanged. I think the foot is marginally better than when I first went in to see the doc, but not majorly.

And, way down deep, I think that a lot of the issues are aggravated by the fact that my weight is up to the highest it's been since 2001. Harder to tackle it if I'm supposed to be not using my foot.

Oh, and I'm going to Tuolumne** Meadows (Yosemite) in a mere 3 weeks, and had hoped to do some hiking! I'm going to be SO not ready for primetime. But at least it should be beautiful, and going with good friends, so that's all good. Haven't been up there in, wow, maybe 20 years, who ever thought it would be that long? There I am in 1970. Still have the hat, not the shirt, which was a huge favorite and perfect light-weight, quick-drying long-sleeved for backpacking or hiking.

I love this photo from wikipedia, maybe I can get some of my own like that! If my lungs can quickly acclimatize to 9000 feet (2743m) elevation:



Now you can keep images of the gorgeous high Sierras in your mind as you go about your weekend.

---

** Tuolumne, pronounced TWA-lum-ee, or too-Ah-lum-ee.

Vet Visit Eye Say

SUMMARY: Both dogs get a checkup and Tika's eye is red.

I took no photos at the vet's office at all. What was I thinking?

Both dogs' schedules have synched up for shots and annual checkups, so we all went in yesterday morning. Best part, both MUTT MVR and the vet's office are air conditioned, and with temps in my yard exceeding 100 F (37.8C) and in the house over 85 F (29.4C) for the last 4 days, the a/c made a welcome respite.

Gave Tika half a sedative tablet an hour before going in. She was still wired when we got there and while we waited a bit, and while the vet did Boost's entire checkup--pacing pacing pacing and rearing up against the door to get out-- and then--boom, just as we finished with Boost, she sank to the floor just lay there panting. Guess the sedative finally won out over 20 minutes of adrenaline. She was fine through the rest of the visit and not too dopey the rest of the day. Hard to figure out what dose exactly to give her. One pill makes her zombie-like for hours, which I don't like. Half a pill might not be enough if we don't have a whole Boost checkup beforehand during which Tika can expend all her angst.

Tika just lives life at a whole different speed. Here's an example: Peanut butter on the tips of my fingers. Tika gets in two licks for every one of Boost's, she's just that much more intense.

But, back to the vet visit.

Boost's heart is like a racehorse at a calm standstill, vet says, nice low even beat.

Tika's heart murmur still sounds minor and otherwise she looks and sounds good, except let's get to the eyes:

• There's that lump in the inner corner of her right eye. Its appearance changed after it seemed to bleed for those couple of days last week, not quite so bloody looking, but still about the same size.
• That same eye now has a red inner eyelid-- "red-eye" or "cherry eye" in color--possibly related to some irritation from the lump or who knows. Now starting an ointment 3x/day.
•  Tika's *left* eye has a dark area on her iris. Something to watch, the vet said, in case it gets larger or looks like it's protruding into the pupil or anything else about it. Great.
• Tika has cataracts in both eyes--I knew that--but vet says that at this stage they should hardly be affecting her vision at all. I still think that might be one of the reasons that we have some issues with tunnels nowadays.

Getting older sucks, eh, Teek?

Over all, dogs seem healthy and things seem to be going swimmingly with Tika. And ka-ching!, another vet bill on the books. Guess I'm grateful that good vet services are available!

See you all later.

Of Dog Eyes and Human Feet

SUMMARY: Eye tested Boost; Tika bloody.

The other day, got this email from Nancy Gyes:

I am involved in a Vision Study with Optometrist Gina Day and her research partner Maureen. Vision testing is being done on dogs suspected of having ETS (early take-off syndrome), or some kind of vision problem that might affect their jumping. We also need to test a large number of non-affected dogs who jump well as a control group. As we are getting into the testing we realize that there is really not nearly enough knowledge about how dogs test that are normal good jumpers. The retinoscopy is used to discover if there is a refraction error in the dogs eyes, since dogs can’t read eye charts, just like babies or young children. We would like to test a lot of shelties and border collies since there are so many of them in agility, but we also want to test lots of other breeds. And we would especially love to test your dog if they are a nice jumper, or if you think your dog may have a vision deficit.

I took Boost up with the theory that there's nothing wrong with her vision--she runs fast, knocks bars but no sign of early or late takeoffs or hesitations. My assumption has been that she knocks bars because she doesn't try hard enough not to.

That might still be the case, but now the waters are a little muddied: Turns out that she and I share something besides a birthday, and that is myopia (near-sightedness) and astigmatism. Of the 30-ish dogs they've tested so far, Boost rates the worst of any in the near-sighted department. On the OTHER paw--she also rates the highest for the quality of her binocular vision (use of two eyes together), so maybe the near-sightedness is less a player since the binocular vision is what gives good depth perception.

They're just starting to collect information, so it could be a long time before they have enough information to actually publish something. Can hardly wait.

Meanwhile, about Tika's odd eye problem (description and photo in this post). This red bloody-looking lump on her inner eyelid(?) showed up around the beginning of April. Don't think it has changed really since then. However, yesterday morning she had bloody crust next to that eye. Same thing when I got home last night. Same thing when I got up this morning. Don't know what it means; still looks about the same to me, she's still not rubbing it or anything.

Anyhoo, off to the vet again to see whether he has any better ideas on what's going on, and if not, maybe to the doggie eye doctor. It's always something involving the wallet, isn't it.

And since we're all going to ail together, I guess, I went ahead and got a cortisone shot in my sore foot today (as mentioned in these posts). As I was afraid of, it's hurting more now, ow ow ow, hope I can get to sleep. Had this same reaction many years ago to a cortisone shot in the thumb, but then it got much better more quickly than w/out the shot. Meanwhile, icing icing icing. And maybe in a few days I'll be pain-free. One can only hope.

Checking In On Tika

SUMMARY: She's doing fine, but what about that eye?

Can you believe that it has already been just about six months since Tika's heart problem surfaced?

We visited our vet today for these reasons:

• Time for a check-up on how she's doing from the vet's perspective.
• Why is she now eating her meals very slowly?--used to finish in half the time that Boost did, now takes twice as long.
• What's the deal with the red lump on her 3rd eyelid?

You can hardly notice the lump at a quick glance, but up close it looks yucky.

I first noticed it sometime the week before the Haute Dawgs trial--so about 3 weeks ago. I don't think it has changed any since then. First question every vet tech asked was, has she had any trauma to the eye? Same from the vet. None that I know of. So, we're going to watch again for a few weeks. Doc says looks like a benign hemangioma (means it's a bloody lump, basically).

Eating--her teeth look great, no sign of pain in her gums. No loss of appetite--still eats everything and is interested in food. Could be any number of things, but without other signs or portents, yet another thing to keep an eye on. Could be her meds, but vet doesn't think that any one of them is more likely than the others.

How's she doing over all? Vet says GREAT! Heart doesn't sound any worse, heartbeat is still strong and slow (despite her frantic terror of being at the vet's) like an athlete's. He said, considering her diagnosis, she's doing very well indeed 6 months later. We'll do a follow-up blood test on general principles in a couple of months.

After that, we bipped across the freeway to Los Gatos Creek Park for a tiny stroll in the sunlight among the Canada Geese and their omnipresent poop. Not too long a walk because Tika was on a sedative, although I gave her only half a tablet this time 90 minutes before the vet.

What a lovely day and what a lucky Human Mom I am.

So many good smells before we even get around the fence to the percolation ponds.

The water fountain has a height just for dogs. Although both Merle Girls thought it was fascinating that water ran into it while they watched, they didn't drink from it.

The gorgeous day called many other people out with their dogs. The one nice thing about a little sedative on the Craussie is no on-leash frenzy about other dogs.

Plus--we have THE best poop bags in the universe. How could the day be any better?