Monday, March 8, 2010

"Misses Sickykins"




I realized the other day that Lottie, our chocolate lab, aka "the baby," has yet to make an appearance on the blog. I hate it that she is making an appearance under these circumstances but oh well....so be it.

About two weeks ago I noticed that Lottie's ears were, to spare you gross details, scabby. So I made a vet appointment and took her in to get checked for what I thought was just an ear infection. While at the vet I noticed that her back legs were swollen and that they were very pink, almost as if she had been chewing on them. To make a VERY long story short, the doctor diagnosed her with vaculitis, which is the inflammation of the blood vessels. So instead of leaving the vet with ear drops, I left with steroids, antibiotics and another prescription to be filled by a pharmacy. Later that week, after she had a HORRIBLE bout of uncontrollable diarrhea (yes, I said uncontrollable) we added a bland diet and Pepcid AC to the growing list of medicines followed by a blood test suggested by the doctor. After two weeks of being medicated and having someone cook her meals of chicken and rice for her EVERYDAY, we believe that Lottie is on the mend. The swelling is gone and her skin is healing. We are beginning to try to wean her off of the steroid at this point and hope that the swelling and scabs don't return but it is just trial and error at this point.

Here is what I have learned thus far about vasculitis: it is normally caused by vaccines or can appear in dogs that have been very sick. Lottie's case is somewhat of a conundrum because neither of these things apply to her. The doctor doesn't really know what is causing this because this isn't normally seen in young, healthy dogs. Also her blood test showed elevated levels in her liver and pancreas which could mean several things: 1) that the elevated levels were caused by the diarrhea 2) that the elevated levels are what has caused the vasculitis 3) the vasculitis has caused the elevated levels 4) she could have vasculitis in her pancreas and liver. The doctor is very pleased with her progress though and very happy that she has a good appetite, high energy and doesn't seem to be showing any signs of abdominal pain. So, like I said, our first hurdle is to see how she does with weaning her off of the steroid. If she does well with that we will move toward adding back in her normal food. If she does not do well we are looking at a possible biopsy of some tissue in her leg and maybe an abdominal scan to see what is going on in her liver and pancreas. As you can see...not just an ear infection. I took her to the doctor on Friday for a checkup and the doctor told me "we are going to be seeing a lot of each other in the next couple of weeks." Great....not exactly what you want to hear.

I can't close this post without trying to explain the title. When we first got Lottie for some reason adding "-kins" to the end of her name just seemed to fit. So her nickname became "Lottiekins" and eventually evolved into "Misses Lottiekins" or sometimes just "Misses Kins." Those later evolved into anything and everything that she did, for example, "Misses Pooterkins" when she poots, "Misses Pouterkins" when she pouts and I can't leave out "Misses Scumperkins" when she, well, scumps. I don't really know what "scumping" is but I believe the word originated with my high school girlfriends and somehow became a go-to word at our house. In this context I would say that Lottie being a "Scumperkins" is her just laying there, looking cute and being her sweet self. And I'll give a little shoutout to my brother-in-law, Pierce, because he thinks all of these names are hilarious and laughs any time I call Lottie anything ending in "-kins."

So if you think about it, say a little prayer for "Misses Sickykins." Pray that we get over this first hurdle and that she can return to our sweet "Scumperkins" sooner rather than later.

- Anna

Friday, March 5, 2010

Very Late Valentine's Day Tidbit

When I started this post it was orginally titled 'Late Valentine's Day Tidbit but seeing that Valentine's day was almost a month ago, I decided to go with the above title. In fact I almost decided to forego this post all together but I felt it was important to share.

As of Friday, Febuary 12th we had no plans for Valentine's day. Which honestly is not out of the ordinary for us. The months of December, January and February are packed with special occasions for us: Christmas, anniversary, my birthday, Preston's birthday and Valentine's day. We get all of our celebrations out of the way within less than a two month time span so, needless to say, by the time Valentine's day rolls around we are kind of over it. Well it just so happened that Preston was playing in a golf tournament Saturday morning. He and a friend from work, Zak, were playing together and they were teamed up to play against their bosses so of course there were stakes. Whoever won had to serve the other a steak dinner. So when I say stakes, I really mean steaks (I crack myself up sometimes). As it would turn out Preston and Zak won. So in an effort to help the bosses save face Preston suggested that they let he and Zak take their wives out for a nice dinner on the company. They totally agreed. Now I know my husband can be very thoughtful and that was a very noble suggestion on his part but don't think he didn't already have THIS in mind! This just happens to be one of his very favorite places in Tucson to get a steak. So off to Flemings we go with the company credit card in hand (I sure hope Uncle Ted isn't reading this!). It was a wonderful dinner, just the two of us, with incredible steaks and live jazz music! A perfect Valentine's day date.

And now for the tidbit. While we were at dinner we were talking about when we started dating WAAAAYYY back in high school. We realized that this past Valentine's day was the tenth anniversary of when Preston told me he loved me for the first time. Well technically he was kind of a chicken and wrote it in my Valentine's day card (which I still have) but I think it still counts. I told him I loved him too and that officially marked the day we started saying 'I love you' to one another. I had no clue as an 18 year old in high school, preparing to leave for college, only having dated this guy for four months and celebrating our first Valentine's day together, that I would get to say 'I love you' to that same guy for the rest of my life! Come to think of it, this is also our tenth year of dating!! Wow! Pretty awesome tidbit don't you think!? Yeah, I thought so too.