[Dailydrool] Worry, this and that

[Jane Hay]

My two legged kids will tell you that I can take "worry" to a whole new
level! I probably worry about our Shadow the most. She was obviously
traumatized at mealtimes before she came to us. We had to hand feed her at
first and I would find little piles of kibble in the corners of the couch,
bathroom, her bed....quite a variety of places. She doesn't hide her kibble
any longer but she still will hide a treat if she doesn't eat it when I
give it to her. You would think that we're asking her to eat a snake in her
bowl at EVERY meal. It's not unusual for her to sit and stare at her bowl
for ten minutes or more. Most of the time she will finally eat when Suzy
finishes and then acts like she's going to eat Shadow's meal. We've tried
everything to entice her to eat by putting smelly sharp cheese, canned cat
food, chopped up ham, beef gravy, soup...quite a variety of things in her
kibble. And I don't want to tell you how many different kibbles we've
tried. Someone suggested that we leave her bowl down for a reasonable
amount of time and then pick it up when everyone else was done eating
because a dog won't let themselves go hungry. Well, it didn't work with
Shadow. She actually started losing weight! She has been with us for almost
five years but this is something that she just can't seem to forget.

Jersey is our lumpy girl. Again, something that I worry about. Lumps scare
me and I know where every single lump on her body is. I haven't mapped it
out but I do a full body rub on her a couple time a week which she loves
and I keep track of the existing lumps and bumps and note any new ones. We
do take her to the vet when we find a new one and he does a needle biopsy.
We've been lucky so far. She had a mastectomy a few years ago for a lump
that was questionable but came back benign (thank doG!) plus she developed
some cysts on her paws a couple of years ago that had to be removed. That
was a miserable experience for her because she had cysts on three of her
four paws that got removed all at the same time. A couple of the cysts were
between her toes and would have been painful if we had left them plus they
might have had to amputate a toe to get to them if we had waited.  It was a
rotten thing to do to her but Jersey is at the age that I don't want her to
be anesthetized any more often or for longer than we have to so we did it
all at once. I know I'm paranoid about lumps but, at the very least, I
would always have a vet check them and do a needle biopsy and have them
removed if there is any question about a possible malignancy.

The mastiffs are visiting for several days while our daughter is in NY
visiting our son. I feel like I'm running a pharmacy right now! Sasha (the
173 pound mastiff) has terrible allergies and a yeast infection and had to
be given seven pills with breakfast along with a cream for an ear
infection. Our Ginger takes one pill for the crystals in her urine and Suzy
takes Proin for her incontinence. Whew! I don't know how you folks with a
herd keep it all straight! Ginger has become so food aggressive that I'm
just going to feed her in the family room while the two big dogs are here.
She won't hesitate to go after either of the mastiffs over food. It's like
she totally loses her mind and doesn't give a rip that both dogs outweigh
her, one by 60 pounds and the other by over 100 pounds! I usually leash her
to our pantry door on one side of the kitchen and the other three
Houndettes eat on the other side of the kitchen and the mastiffs eat in the
sun room but everyone was so much more relaxed this morning with Ginger
gated away from all of them. I hate to isolate her like that but it made a
huge difference this morning.

We have tons of drool going on here and are happy to sling it to all in
need!

Jane & the Houndettes
Jersey, Shadow, Suzy & Ginger
with mastiffs, Sasha & Brutus
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