Shih Tzu Dog Blog

Recovery time!

It's Day 6 since the girls' spaying and they've clearly not only lost their uterus and ovaries, but they've also lost their minds. This has been the cheapest lobotomy/age-regression procedure ever.

They have gone completely bananas acting like tiny puppies again and mommy's THRILLED. They're playing tag and skidding throughout the house, Jewel goes berserk whenever I show thee suh-lightest bit of excitement and she's all motor paws on my knees and wanting to lick my face off and playing hand-to-paw.

Willow still cries and TOTALLY takes advantage of her 'convalescence' and wants to be held all the time. Even at 3am, she'll go wandering and whimpering so Daddy will wake up and go out to the living room and hold her like a baby on the couch. And you know what? He DOES! and don't you dare leave her on the couch in the living room by herself cuz she can't jump down to find you! Whine whine whine, cry cry cry cry....

eeeeehhhhhhuuuuuhhhhh....I am soooooooooooooo patheeeeeeeetiiiiiiiiiiic........

Their incisions appear to be healing well. We've had no oozing or gapping and mom's reallyreallyreally been good about not pulling on the scabs on the incisions (compulsive picker...)

Willow's incision, 4-5 days ago...

They aren't itching at their sides so much, though there's still a little rash of pinprick size scabs at their ribs from the first few days.
Since they had hernia repairs done, he did the procedure through that incision, so it's a bigger incision (I imagine) than for a routine spay. The advantage is that they can't reach the incision with either tongue, teeth or toenails. Jewel did try to 'help' Willow (as the vet had warned us) by starting to lick on Willow's incision, but Mom put a stop to that and she hasn't tried it since.

Jewel: loving feeling normal again!

Jewel and Willow Get Spayed

Having recently become women, it was time to spay the girls. Our poor babies! We thought it was a simple procedure. Not the case. When it comes to female dogs, their entire feminine insides are removed. Becky dropped the girls off in the morning while Ian picked them up in the afternoon.

First Jewel was brought in. She was mellow and barely acknowledged Ian. Willow, on the other hand, immediately jumped into daddy's arms and started whining. She whined all the way home, and near constantly until 8 am this morning. Jewel, however, has been silent and sleeping nearly the entire time. As if the surgery weren't enough, this weekend, starting yesterday is projected to be in the mid 90s, so last night they had to deal with heat as well. Willow also, had a tooth pulled, so that may explain the extra level of discomfort that Jewel seems not to be experiencing. This picture sums up Willow's expression for the last day and a half. Yesterday she was panting, but today her breath is normal.

Here they are trying to be comfortable. The scars are actually bigger than normal, becuase they had hernias that needed to be repaired.

Jewel is fine as long as she is near one of us. Willow is needing contact. I think they know they are in pain but don't know why. As long as they are with us, they feel safe, so stay calm and quiet.

We have had some fun pictures lately so here are a few to chear us all up. Here is Willow helpping out with the our remodeling of the kitchen pantry.