Howllo Fellow Hound and keeping track of Emma lovers: We are so excited to be half way through the healing process. It seems like a life time to me, and I am trying to stay positive looking ahead to another week of this. As Emma heals she get more itchy.

Today, for the first time, she laid in one of her favorite spots outside. Our Emma is a serious sun bather.

Here she is a bit closer up:

We will be around all weekend doing some steady healing! Hey, is that light I see at the end of the tunnel?

Keep in touch……..

More healing news later….Cat, Chaps and Emma

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Hollow Fellow Hound and swelling down lovers! LOL! Wow, that took a long time. She is healing well and the surgery site looks great. You can’t really tell from this picture, but she looks good.

She is outside walking around with her Grandma right now. It’s a beautiful day and she can enjoy some fresh air.

More updates later. Count down to stitch removal in full swing.

Love, Cat, Chaps and Emma

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Howllo Fellow Hound and day six lovers: We are almost 1/2 way home to getting Emma’s stitches out and the optivisor off. I think Emma is feeling a bit depressed today. You have to wonder if she thinks she is never getting that thing off. She has no way of knowing.

It will all be over soon and we can get back to normal.

More updates later….Cat, Chaps and Emma

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Howllo Fellow Hound and not loving the pill giving procedure, (at all)! I thought that I would share my trick for pill giving with my friends. Emma cannot tolerate protein. She is allergic to most everything so I have to be careful. That means no meat or cheese.

She is on antibiotics and pain medicine after her procedure.

Emma can extract a pill from anything and then hold it in her mouth, while wagging her tail until you walk away. Then, days later, you will find them scattered in the bed. NOT GOOD!

Here is my almost fail safe solution.

Give us our day, our daily bread pill taking method!

Buy a bag of soft white bread and a pill cutter.

These are Emma’s pills for the day. After I cut the big one into 4 pieces, she gets 5 pieces – twice a day.

As you can see, I have the 10 pieces of pill cut for her. 1/2 in the am and 1/2 in the pm. Believe me, I have tried everything and she can spit them out. This is the only method that works for smart girls like Emma.

Place each pill piece into a soft bread square and make a ball. Remember when you were a kid and balled up bread? Well, hounds are just kids and they love it too!

The bread balls are ready for the day, but why are there extra sections needing to be balled up?

Chaps gets the placebo!

More bread balls later…….Cat, Chaps and Emma

P.S. did you notice the star I drew near my thumb? That is how I remember things very important. I need more bread tomorrow.

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Howllo Fellow Hound and counting the days lovers: WT Heck? Are you kidding me? 11 more days? It seems like it has been 11 years. Why does the time fly so fast when one is having fun? I guess it is all psychological.

Emma is doing great today. We had a bit of a scare yesterday when she started dripping blood from her nose on the side of the enucleation. Since it was just a drip here and there and it was light red my Vet said that he was not concerned. It took awhile to get a hold of him and that is where the scare came in. He said that this did not concern him. Only if it were streaming would he be concerned.

I am hoping that by recording this event, it might help someone in the future that is going though the same thing.

OFFICE MEMO….

Emma is back at work today with me. She is in her office area. Her work is piling up but Chaps has agreed to work OT this weekend to help pull her weight! LOL

All kidding aside, I love having Emma back with me in my office. I am sooooooo lucky!

More OFFICE MEMOS later…..Cat, Chaps and Emma

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Howllo Fellow Hound and itchy neck haters! I had to show you this picture of our Emma. Our girl is allergic to most everything, so her neck is usually itchy anyway. I think the plastic chin strap is causing a reaction, plus the water from drinking is trapped under it so I had to come up with a solution, FAST!

I tucked this white face cloth under the chin strap to keep the plastic off her neck and it also helps soak up the excess water she drinks. I have a zillon of these white cloths which is nice because I change it every time she drinks. I am keeping my paws crossed because so far she has not scratched her neck since I came up with this solution!

I was eating lunch, looked down and saw her looking so cute. I had to take a picture. She was like my little ghost girl. They clipped her toe nails during surgery and I did not hear her come in the room.

Gotta run, she is drinking water. Time for a cloth change!

More cute pictures later….Cat, Chaps and our Emma

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Howllo Fewllo Hound and Emma update lovers:

It is Sunday morning and the kids are still in bed. Emma is progressing. One day down 13 to go before we get the stitches removed. My Vet had a more difficult time with her procedure so he wants to keep the stitches in for 14 days instead of the normal 10. Hey, whatever. I am used to bad news. Chin up and face forward. Emma does not need a sour puss.

I have mentioned that Emma has gone out the dog door a few times but it has been with my help. This morning at about 3:33am (watching the clock) I felt Emma getting up. She walked very slowly over to her water bowl and drank a gallon (a lot). Then I heard her head down the hallway towards the dog door.
Ah, what a good girl. She did it all by herself! It’s funny how the sound of a dog door clicking can make one smile at 3:36am.

She was always a quick learner. Her determination is very powerful.

Oh yeah, the hospital room:

This is what it looked like yesterday and this is what it will look like pretty much all day today. My Mom has been a SAINT through all of these procedures. What ever Emma wants, Emma gets. I am usually back and forth but mainly I get to work in my office during the day.
I could do all of this on my own but……….Oh I shutter to think.

More progressing news later………Love, Cat, Chaps and Emma

P.S. click the picture and see how Grandma has Emma’s favorite toys tucked in next to her. Pretty sweet to have a Grandma like that!

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Howllo Fellow Hound and keeping track of Emma lovers:

We are home. Emma was exceptional making her way into our home. She is so awe inspiring. Emma ate a half meal and I was able to give her some pain medicine. She has not moved from the dining room.

This is the side where the prosthetic was removed. As you can see there is some drainage, but her doctor told me not to wipe it away for obvious reasons. Wiping would cause pulling.

Chaps was besides himself because he was behind a gate for a bit. I decided to let him out and he did just fine. The new optivisor allowed him sniff around her a bit more freely. He quickly, took his place laying besides her.

A few friends and family have called but I am not answering the phone. Emma’s vet is calling tonight and I do not have call waiting. (I hate call waiting). So I am waiting by the phone to ask a few questions of her doctor. Her procedure was a bit more complicated than he had hoped for. He has instructed that Emma wear the opitvisor for 14 days instead of 10 days, which she did with the first eye removal.

Everyone at the vet office seemed to really love the optivisor. So far, so great!

More later…. I have to go wait by the phone.

Cat, Chaps and Emma

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UPDATE – EMMA’S DOCTOR JUST CALLED AND SHE IS FINE. HE GOT STARTED A BIT LATE. SHE IS RECOVERING AND I GET TO PICK HER UP ABOUT 6:00 TONIGHT, MAYBE A BIT EARLIER. THE PROCEDURE WAS A BIT MORE COMPLICATED THAN HE WANTED, BUT SHE IS DOING GREAT. TAKING OUT A PROSTHETIC IS DIFFERENT OF COURSE THAN TAKING OUT AN EYE. THANK YOU EVERYONE FOR YOUR SUPPORT AND KINDNESS. I AM GOING TO GO CHANGE HER BED AND GET HER ALL READY FOR TONIGHT.

I WILL TRY TO DO ANOTHER POSTING THIS EVENING. CAT

Howllo Fellow Hound and Surgery haters: Can there be a worse way to spend a day, or the 10 that follow it in the healing process? Well, because of the Optivisor, our healing process will be a zillion times better. You can read about the cool new product a few blogs below. I also link to their website.

Anyway, Emma is still in bed. I just hate that she has to go through this. It is just not fair. She does so much for everyone else. Did you know that her and I are raising money towards basset hound glaucoma?

Here is our Firstgiving page:

Emma Rudert raises money for basset glaucoma research

Well, I better go wake her up………….Sigh

I will keep everyone posted.

More later…Cat, Chaps and Emmers

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Howllo Fellow Hound and E-collar, Victorian collar, and cone haters. A cone by any another other name is still the same!
THE TORTURE DEVISE!

I laid awake at night wondering, “can’t anyone make this piece of *bleep* better?” So, to answer my question I go to the all knowing GOOGLE!

I knew that Emma was going to need to wear a torture devise again after her history came to light. The eye vet said that she had congenital glaucoma. When he put her fake eye in, he did a check of her other eye and said her drainage angles were severely mal-aligned from birth. He told me that Emma was born with glaucoma.

So, GOOGLE led me to this Australian website: http://provizoraustralia.com/

I roamed over it with much anticipation and joy. Could there be something better? I had seen a few other products, but they were not suited for eye surgery. This one is designed for eye surgery!

I bookmarked it for future use! Well, the future always come faster than one thinks and before I knew it, Emma was needing the fake eye removed. I was kicking myself for not purchasing the Optivisor sooner!
I better get one fast and I needed it yesterday!

Come to find out, the Optivisor is not sold to the consumer!!!!!! It is only sold to eye vets. (There are not very many of them).

Here is how it went down!

****************************************************

I searched the Internet to no luck on how to buy one.

I e-mailed Australia and got a reply that they would forward my e-mail to the Canadian and USA rep.

The rep e-mailed me and told me about how they only sell them to eye doctors, But……………(did he say but?)

YES! He would be willing to send Emma one!

There are several reasons I am so happy.

1.) Chaps attacks Emma when she approaches him wearing an E-collar. It scares the holy stuff out of him which in turn hurts and petrifies Emma. (That really aids the healing process – Ugh)

2.) Emma has figured out her exact spacing in the home and knows exactly how to get around. The dreaded e-collar adds about 4 inches on each side of her head which means she is bumping into everything which means she is scared, which means I am a nervous wreck, which means you get my point. The new Optivisor hugs her head.

3.) Emma can eat and drink better with the new Opitvisor!

4.) Drum roll please…………..Emma can go out the potty door with the Optivisor!

Without further droning and blogging, here are the pictures of our Emma trying out the new Optivisor which arrived today!

We love you David!

Please note the lines on the plastic near her nose. I have snipped off the bottom one to adjust better to her snout for eating and breathing. I might have to snip off the second section. I will monitor that.

Look how streamline the shield is to the face. I think she is really going to like this much better. I know Chaps will.

LQQK!

Our girl even ate her dinner tonight with it on. Don’t get me wrong. She still would rather be without a devise, but the difference between this and the e-collar will save a lot of heartache.

Sometimes one gets a ray of light in a storm.

More Later…Cat, Chaps and Emma

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