Before, After and After Again

Well, it's been a busy time with vet appointments for Mason. Last week he went to the Animal Eye Hospital for an eye check up. This is a requirement for future guide dogs. The good news is that Mason's eyes are fine.


Dr. Bonney and Veronica check Mason's eyes.

On Tuesday we went to Towne North Animal Hospital for Mason to get neutered. Below is a picture before the appointment.


BEFORE

There is a Far Side cartoon of a car backing out of a driveway. The dog in the back seat of the car is bragging to a dog on the other side of a fence. He says, “Ha, ha ha, Biff. Guess what? After we go to the drugstore and the post office, I’m going to the vet’s to get tutored.”


Mason looking forward to getting "tutored"


AFTER - A wiser dog emerges sporting an E-collar to prevent him from taking out his stitches.


"I am smiling!"

Later that night Mason decided he didn't want to have stitches anymore. Where there is a will there is a way. Mason has a strong will and made a way - E-collar or not. He started pulling out his stitches. Luckily we caught him right away. But what could we do? The first thing was to hold him while calling Michelle Pelletier, Puppy Department Supervisor. She suggested covering the incision and wrapping an ace bandage lightly around the area to get us through the night until he could be rechecked. We did that but Mason didn't want to take "No" as a negative. As soon as we looked away he was trying to get the bandage off. We knew we had to make the E-collar larger. We looked around to see what might work. We came up with 2 giant playing cards. We had them as decorations for the Guide Dogs of Texas Casino night in April. We taped them to the E-collar and they did the trick. Later we cut them down a bit.

Mason is finally resigned to his fate of having stitches.

Mason made it through the night. We heard loud scraping noises every time he moved in his crate but he hadn't bothered his incision any more. Mason needed a little help eating his breakfast the next morning.

Yummy

By the time we got back to the vet's office Mason found that he could press down on his collar and chew the playing cards. We knew the quick fix wouldn't have lasted another night.

AFTER AGAIN - Dr. McIlhany and Carlos fit Mason with a larger E-collar.

Mason was his normal, spirited self during the appointment. Dr. McIlhany said, "He's quite a handful, isn't he?" We agreed. The doctor gave us some tranquilizers to help Mason stay a bit calmer during his healing. Someone asked if the tranquilizers were for Mason of for us! Whatever!

So, that's Mason's Before, After and After Again story. He's now adjusted to the larger collar and is not running into so many things. There's never a dull moment when raising an guide dog puppy!