November 9, 2010

Glimpses of Her Old Puppy Self (& Incision Pics!)

Yesterday we definitely saw signs of our old pupster. My friend Louisa came over last night and Abby has always loved to jump on and nibble upon Louisa. (When she gets really excited, she starts out licking and then progresses to gnawing quite quickly. The puppy, that is - not Louisa.) On Saturday, when Louisa came by for our usual Saturday morning writing session, Abby was happy to see her and whined and told Louisa all her troubles and gave her kisses, but then pretty much crashed. But last night, she was like her old self, trying to jump up on Louisa and gnawing on her hands. 

Now, somehow, I thought the dog would magically stop doing all the jumping/gnawing after all this. I imagined something like this going through her little puppy head: "Wow, I've had a brush with death. From this day forward I'm going to be the best dog I can possibly be!" And she would listen to her mother and do everything she's asked to do. 

Silly me. I should have known that the bad habits she had before the surgery would still be around post-surgery. I thought, though, that it might be harder for her to jump up on people, post-surgery. But it was fairly stupid of me to think that, because of course she still has two big strong back legs to stand up on. 

Anyway, I was sort of happy to see the jumping/gnawing as she seemed like her old puppy self. Then she even went and got her new toys and started playing with them, which was nice to see since it's the first time she's really tried to play since her surgery on 10/29. Here she is trying to destruct the indestructible stuffed man that Aunt Terry brought her. So far, he remains intact. 

She's still having to wear her collar today. The second I take it off her she starts licking her incision, but I managed to convince her to stop chewing on herself long enough to take a couple of pictures to show how nicely she's heeling up. It looks way better, but for now I think we'll stick with keeping a T-shirt on her, so we don't scare the neighbors. (Oh, and I thought of another thing I want to have custom-printed on a T-shirt for her: IHOP.)


Tomorrow we have chemo at 10a.m. (Assuming the oncologist is done with jury duty! Please keep your fingers crossed that they won't have to cancel our appointment!) Assuming we get in, I'll blog all about it afterward. Wish us luck! 


Jean, I can't wait to hear what the 3rd graders think of all this. I practically had my hairdresser in tears this morning telling her the whole saga. Had to reassure her that Abby's doing great!

8 comments:

  1. Just like a people--a brush with death makes them behave for a TINY bit then they are back to smoking and joking!

    Love the t-shirt idea--just make sure IHOP doesn't come after you for copyright infringement. I would hate for Abby to get a "cease and desist" letter!

    She looks good.

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  2. Maybe I could find some sort of official IHOP paraphernalia (I had no clue there was that extra 'r' in paraphernalia until just now...) - that way it would just be free advertising for them. She could be their new mascot!

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  3. I think it's especially touching that you can see her "Live Strong" collar in these new photos.

    My third-graders couldn't get over it. Wait til you see the letters. They want her to visit!

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  4. Yes, that was a hand-me-down (paw-me-down?) from Bailey.

    I can't wait for the letters. I'm sure she would LOVE to visit them. She would go bananas in a room full of little kids.

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  5. Wow. It's looking better quickly! She looks so calm and angelic!

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  6. Calm and angelic?? Ha. That was only for about 5 seconds after 10 minutes of me going, "No, don't chew it." "Stop licking it." "No chewing." "Leave it." And repeatedly pushing her face away from her boo-boo. And her getting really irritated with me. (I think she's actually laying there plotting how she can get back at me...)

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  7. What happened with the indestructible disc/water bowl I sent you? Is it still intact?

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  8. Yes, Linda, the indestructible frizbee/water bowl is still in one piece. It really does seem to be indestructible. She chews on it and tosses it around every now and then.

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