Saying goodbye to an old friend

See that cute little guy right there?  That little guy is, well, was, Buddy.  Buddy came to us back in 2002.  It's actually kind of a funny story.  My neighbor found him running around in the middle of a busy street.  He stopped, picked him up and brought him home.  Problem was, my neigbor had 2 female dogs and the little guy he brought home wasn't fixed.  So everyday, looking out my office window (I worked from home), I would see the little Yorkie just sitting in the backyard.  I began to feel sorry for the little guy and one day, after my neighbor had left for work, I snuck over and got him and brought him back to my house.  I gave him a bath (he was pretty stinky) and observed how he interacted with the kids.  We called him "Little Buddy".  Then in the afternoon, before my neighbor returned home, I would sneak back over and put him back.  This went on for some time but then the little guy began sitting at the fence, staring straight into my office window, barking for me to come get him...EVERY night.   They would call him to come in and he would pretend he didn't hear them.  I knew my gig was about to be up, so I got up my nerve and went to call on the neighbors.  I told them that the kids loved him and that we would be happy to give him a home.  They happily gave him into our care and that is where he stayed until this past August.  I asked what they were calling him and they said, "We were just calling him Buddy."  So, Buddy it was.  A couple winters ago (the winter of the big snow), we started noticing that maybe Buddy was losing his mind a little.  He would bark for us to come get him upstairs (he liked to be upstairs where it was quiet but had fallen coming down the stairs and refused to come down on his own now), we would let him out and then he would stand there on the front porch, sometimes for 10 minutes, like he couldn't remember why he wanted to go out.  It was when he started going to the bathroom in the house that we knew it was time.  He had NEVER pottied in the house and you could just tell that it really bothered him when it happened (we didn't fuss at him because we knew he couldn't help it).  So, I set a date and I did it.  He was 13 years old (actually the vet estimated his age as 3-5 when we got him so he was 12-14, we always just went with the middle).  It was a rainy, miserable day, but all the better to hide my tears, right?  We went to the vet's office and then we brought him home in his little bed and buried him in the woods behind our house.  I still see him sometimes (no, I don't believe in ghosts, just my mind seeing what it's used to seeing).  I'll turn the corner of our driveway and think I see his little self trucking it down the road.  I still hesitate before I put the recliner down, because we accidentally shut him in it once.  It's hard.  These little lives become a part of ours and even though you know it's for the best and that they can't live forever, you just don't want to say goodbye.

Wednesday, my mom had had to take Kaylee in for the same reason.  Kaylee was my grandmother's dog.  My grandmother passed away 2 years ago this past July.  My mom and I promised my grandmother that we would take good care of Kaylee.  She began having some bathroom issues months ago but we just chalked it up to stress, because my mom leaves on weekends to work on a volunteer building project, and my sister was keeping her.  But recently, she started getting that look in her eye, like she didn't know where she was or what was going on.  Sometimes, she wouldn't respond to her name.  Wednesday, she lay in her bed unresponsive, after having just gone to the bathroom in her bed.   So, it was time.  It wasn't fair to keep her around just because she was the last living memory of Grandma.  So Mom took her in, and now she lays in the woods next to Buddy.  She was 13 years old.

We are so thankful for the joy they brought to our lives, the silly things they did to make us laugh, the times they lay beside us and licked our tears and the companionship they gave so willingly when we needed it most.  We will miss them but they will live on in our memories and the pictures and stories we tell.

Castor Oil For Hematomas

A few years ago, I awoke one Saturday morning and went to go let our Lab, Koda, outside.  We have a laundry room off of our garage and he gets to sleep in there.  He was shaking his head constantly and upon examination, one of his ears was about 1/2 thick or more and squooshy.  We immediately called the vet, not sure what was going on.  They informed us that, without a doubt, he had an aural hematoma or ear hematoma.  Possibly from shaking his head around (he's constantly jumping in the pond and then shaking off), he had hit something and injured his ear, causing it to fill up with blood.  We were ready to throw him in the truck and do whatever to get him fixed up.  Unfortunately, they also informed us that they did not have an anesthesiologist in on Saturdays and that the surgery to fix this required the dog be put under.  They place a drain in the ear to drain the blood and then it later has to be removed.  According to them, if this is not done, it may heal on its own but the dog's ear will be extremely disfigured, like someone ran a thread through it and then pulled the thread tight.  We were supposed to wait until Monday and bring him in, or I guess we could have also opted for the ER vet.  Well, I had my Castor oil with a little lavender oil mixed in, remembered it was good for bruises because it dispersed the blood, so we gave that a try.  3 times a day, my husband rubbed his ear with it, rubbing and massaging.  We noticed improvement right away but by the third day, his ear looked completely normal and he was acting completely normal.  I later took him in for his annual visit and the vet could not believe it.  She said he must not have had a hematoma because there is no way his ear looked like that without having been drained.  (She also told me straight up that she does not believe in natural medicine because she only believes in things for which she's seen proof.  Yet she saw proof and denied it.)  As you can imagine, I was thrilled that once again, natural medicine had done something to shock and amaze a practitioner of modern medicine.  This had happened to me before with my son, but that's another story.  Next I'll tell you about castor oil vs. the ant bite, and I'm not talking about your average ant bite either.

Koda with 2 perfectly normal and beautiful ears!