Switching to Weekly Updates (Plus, a Funny Little Story)

I meant to mention this in my post yesterday, but since there haven't been any major developments or emergencies with Lexie over the past week (thank GOD!), I probably will not be giving daily updates from this point on, unless something out of the ordinary happens, of course.  Instead, I will probably start posting weekly updates about Lou's recovery and adjustment to her new life as a blind Dobe.  This way, I won't wear you out with boring posts like, "Lexie ate, drank, slept, and used the bathroom a couple times today.  Tune in tomorrow to see what exciting things she does next!" 

I will tell you that the swelling above her right eye is now showing definite signs of improvement, which is quite a relief.  Her left eye must have had a tad bit of swelling, too, which I didn't really notice until yesterday.  It's not that I noticed her left eye was swollen, though, it's more like I've noticed that the swelling must be going away because now her left eye is actually starting to look a little "sunken in."  It's a little weird, I'm not going to lie, but at least her incision in that eye looks really, really good. 

Another weird thing I've noticed is that, even though Lexie no longer has any eyes in her sockets, the muscles around her eyes still move sometimes, as though she's looking around.  In fact, when I first noticed this the other night, it was actually quite a funny moment.  (I'm a little embarrassed to share this, but it's too funny to keep to myself.) 

Now, admittedly, I was a bit tipsy when this happened.  Justin and I were having a nice, relaxing evening at home, and I had probably had two or three glasses of wine by this point.  I decided to use the flashlight app on my iPhone to check Lexie's incisions, and when I held the flashlight up to her face, I noticed her eye muscles move.  Obviously, her eye muscles were probably just reacting to the sensation of something being held close to her face all of a sudden, but in my tipsy state I actually thought that she had reacted to the light.  So, I said to Justin, "Hey, are we sure that Lexie can't see anything?"  (Mind you, her eyeballs have been surgically removed.)  Justin immediately burst into laughter, then quickly regained his composure and said, in a very calm and reassuring manner, "I am absolutely, 100% positive."

Okay, okay, so maybe it wasn't the smartest question I've ever asked, but at least it's given us something to laugh about.  :)

One Week Post-Surgery

Well, we've made it a WHOLE WEEK without having to rush Lexie to the vet!  Hooray!!!  I am also happy to report that, as of this morning, the swelling above Lexie's right eye looks like it may have gone down a tiny bit.  It hasn't improved much, by any means, but some progress is better than no progress.  I'm not worried about it being an abscess, either, because it's not tender, it's not seeping at all, and it doesn't feel warm to the touch.  In fact, her incisions actually look really good!  She's such a good patient, too.  She never protests when I apply a warm compress to her eye, and last night she even let me clean some of the dried scabs off of her cheek and the bridge of her nose without whining or even moving a muscle.  I figure Lexie's been poked and prodded so much at this point that she probably understands that people are actually trying to help her whenever they mess with her face and eyes like that.

As far as adjusting to being blind, Lou is definitely getting around the house a little better than she was a week ago.  She still gets a little lost from time to time, and she still refuses to go out onto the back deck or use the bathroom in the back yard for some unknown reason; however, she does a much better job of finding the water bowl in the kitchen all by herself, and Lexie has even established a preferred route from the kitchen into the living room, which is through the dining room. 

Lexie is also finally becoming more confident about climbing onto the couch, which makes me very happy because that has always been her favorite spot to snuggle and sleep.  For a while, she would only get up on the couch at night, after Justin and I had gone to bed.  We had tried coaxing her onto the sofa with us several times over the last few days, but she would always just lay down by our feet instead.  Then, last night this happened:



I still tear up when I watch that video.  Haha! 

We also decided not to give Lexie any pain medication last night, as she seemed more alert and hasn't really been showing any signs of pain (when we first brought her home, we knew it was time for her pain medication whenever she would kind of start trembling).  Our plan is to cut back on her Tramadol and only give it to her once in the morning because it will help her sleep while we're at work.  If she starts showing any signs of pain, of course, we will give her another dose at night, but I really don't think we'll need to.

So, overall, Lexie's first week of recovery has gone fairly smoothly.  We're still about another week away from being able to have her stitches removed, but in the meantime these are the next signs of progress that I'd like to see:

• I'm hoping that the swelling above Lexie's right eye will greatly improve within the next week.
• I want Lexie to eat better (we're completely cutting out table food for all the girls). 
• I'd love to see Lexie's mood improve.
• We'd eventually like to ween her off the pain medications completely.
• I expect Lexie to become even more familiar with the layout of the house and bump into walls, furniture, etc. much less.

What I Haven't Told You...

I wanted to take a moment to address something that I’ve been hearing a lot during the last month or so.  While I have greatly appreciated all the kind comments and praises that I’ve received for going to such great lengths to save Lexie’s vision, and eventually her life, I feel that if everyone knew exactly what Lexie, Jocie, Sam and I have been through together, they wouldn’t think that I was just being a good pet owner, they’d understand that there simply was no other option when it came to saving my Lou.  Therefore, for the sake of painting a more complete picture, I have decided to share an important part of our past.  (I haven’t shared this story before now because, well, it’s kind of a downer, and I also didn’t want people to think that I was just pulling out all the stops to gain sympathy, especially when I had to ask for donations a few weeks ago). 

My girls and I experienced a horrible tragedy in August of 2009, when my husband of 7 years, Chris (whom I had been with for 14 years), chose to take his own life.   He made this decision after a long struggle with alcoholism and failing physical and mental health (pancreatitis and possibly early schizophrenia, although he was never officially diagnosed).  Chris and I had always planned to have children someday, but until we felt the time was right, Jocie, Sam, and Lexie were our children. (It was actually Chris who insisted that we adopt Lexie, despite my reservations about owning three dogs at the time, because he wanted to have a least one dog he was confident would protect me whenever he was away.)  

It’s impossible for me to give a Cliff’s Notes version about everything that happened leading up to Chris’ suicide because it was (to put it very mildly) a giant, complicated, five-year-long mess.   The bottom line is that his gradual, almost unnoticeable at first, downward spiral of mental illness took a sudden plunge in the last few months before his death.  At one point, after we had eventually separated, he had uncharacteristically threatened to shoot me, shoot the dogs, and then shoot himself.  For this reason, when he showed up at my house on that warm, summer night almost three years ago, I initially struggled when he tried to push his way through the front door because my first instinct was to protect the girls.  However, when the towel he was carrying fell to the ground and revealed that he was holding a gun, I knew I just had to get away from him as quickly as possible.  To this day, I still wonder if he had actually come to the house that night with the intention of shooting me and the girls, as well as himself.  I guess I’ll never know, but I will be forever thankful that he let me go and allowed all three of our girls run out of the house before he took his own life in the living room.

Needless to say, it was an extremely traumatic experience for all of us.  Jocie became reclusive, Sam lost almost all the fur off her back, and Lexie wouldn’t let me out of her sight for the month or so that we stayed at my Dad’s afterwards.  Finally, after I was unable to find a new place to live that would allow me to keep all three dogs, I made the very difficult decision to move back into my house.  I wasn’t sure if I would be able to survive in that house, which was so full of wonderful, horrible, and now tragic memories, but the night we moved back in I knew I had made the right decision for my girls, as I hadn’t seen them so relaxed or happy in a very long time.   

Jocie, Sam, and Lexie all comforted me with their unconditional love during that very difficult grieving period, but it was Lexie who actually motivated me to keep moving forward.   It was hard for me to stay sad or depressed for too long when inevitably Lou would bring me one of her stuffed animals and try to entice me off the couch for a game of chase.  It was also hard to feel lonely when Lexie would always insist on laying her head in my lap every time I watched TV, talked on the phone, worked on my laptop, etc.  She even helped me run the household, so to speak, by making sure that I and her sisters stuck to a strict feeding and bathroom schedule (her internal clock is pretty impressive).   In fact, watching all three of my girls fall so easily back into their daily routines and carry on with their lives, thanks to Miss Lexie always cracking the proverbial whip, greatly inspired me to pick up the pieces of my own life and move on.

The bottom line is that Lexie is the one who deserves all the praise for saving me.  She helped me survive when I needed her most, and so I will never do anything less than the same for her.

An ER-Free Weekend!

That's right, we made it through the entire weekend without an emergency trip to the ER!  Woo hoo!  Lexie's incisions barely even had any oozing yesterday.  (By the way, I wish there was another word I could use besides "oozing," because that just sounds so gross to me, but I really don't know what else to call it.) 

Sam has continued to be a little pouty, but usually only when Lexie is actively receiving more attention than her, especially from Justin.  For example, I took these photos yesterday of Justin giving Lexie a little bit of lovin's and also helping her eat (it's difficult for Lou to reach the food in her new elevated bowl when she's wearing her E-collar, so we have to kind of tilt the bowl towards her so she can get the food):

After I took those photos, I turned around to find Sam laying on the couch in full-pout mode as she watched HER Justin giving Lexie all of his attention:

Yes, I know.  She's pitiful.  Don't let her fool you, though.  Sam knows what she's doing.  She knows that as soon as we see her in such a pitiful state, she will immediately receive some undivided attention from either or both of us, which is exactly what happened after I took that photo of her.  At least she's just being pouty in order to receive attention, though, and she's not actually being resentful toward Lexie.  Just a few moments after the above photo was taken, I found Sam curled up with Lexie in the new doggy bed:

Earlier, I had experienced another "awwwww" moment when Zach and Kristy came over to watch True Blood.  Lexie loves Kristy, who was her running partner before Lexie went blind, and Kristy loves Lexie.  So, as soon as Lexie heard Kristy's voice last night, she got up from her doggy bed and tried to find her.  Kristy had followed Zach into the laundry room and didn't realize Lexie was looking for her, but I watched silently from the couch as Lexie found her way through the kitchen all by herself and finally reached Kristy.  When Kristy felt Lexie kind of run into the back of her legs, she spun around and said, "Hi, Lou!" then bent down to pet her.  As I saw Lexie do the infamous "Dobe lean" into Kristy's arms (the equivalent of a human hug for Dobermans), I immediately teared up. 

The best moment of the night, though, came when Justin and I were taking care of Lexie before bed.  While administering her last dose of pain meds for the night and making sure her E-collar was secure, both Sam and Jocie came over to "help" me and Justin tuck Lou in:

All in all, it was a very good, drama-free weekend at our house...for a change!  We've still got a long road ahead of us, as right now we're just sort of in the initial "stitches-watching" phase, which is going to last about another week and a half until her stitches come out.  Then, we can REALLY dive into helping Lexie adjust by taking her on walks with her sisters, trying new games, and just working with her in general to help her become as independent as possible.

A Little Forward and a Little Backward

I'm definitely considering Lexie's unwillingness to go into the back yard to use the bathroom a step backward for now.  I don't understand it.  She managed to find her way around the back yard before her enucleation (when she first went blind), and even after her enucleation Lexie has gone down the back steps into the yard, used the bathroom, and found her way back up the steps without much difficulty, but only a couple of times.  Since her enucleation surgery, she just does not want to come out onto the back deck, let alone find her way down the steps to the yard.  I just don't get it!

The only way we've been able to get Lexie to use the bathroom since she's come home from MedVet is to put on her harness and walk her out to the grassy median in front of the house.  For some reason, she has no problem manipulating the two sets of steps leading from our front door and down to the walkway, so I'm totally puzzled about why she won't do the same for the steps in the back yard.


Anyway, Justin and I had the best, laziest Saturday with our Lou.  She spent most of the day zonked out due to her pain medication, but during the times she was awake she was all smiles.

All day yesterday, Justin and I tried to get Lexie to get up on the couch with us, which has always been her favorite place to sleep and cuddle.  However, she just seemed too nervous to try.  This morning, however, I came downstairs and found her sound asleep on the couch.  Her E-collars were on the floor, so I checked her stitches immediately and was relieved to find them perfectly intact.  Then, after replacing her hard E-collar, I proceeded to cuddle her like crazy on the couch for the next three hours.

While we were cuddling, the "old Lou" made her first appearance since before her surgeries.  One of the reasons why Lexie earned her reputation as being "our little turd" is because of how demanding she can be when it comes to receiving cuddles and attention.  As you can see in the following video, if I stopped petting her for more than a few seconds, she'd start groaning in protest:



By the way, I realize that some people may find Lexie's incisions a little hard to look at, but, if it makes you feel any better, her incisions look really good, especially compared to after her last surgery.  Here is a side-by-side comparison:

So, I guess that's the update for now.  She's happy and her wounds all look good, but we haven't made a ton of forward progress yet in terms of her adjustment to blindness.  It's only been two days, though.  I can tell you this much:  it's going to be SO HARD for me to leave Lexie and go to work tomorrow.  I'm probably going to worry about her all day, but at least Justin always comes home for lunch and he can check on her for me.

Lexie's Second Homecoming

Lexie was SO happy to be going home last night!  As you can hear in the video, though, I was a little disappointed when they brought her out without a hard E-collar.  The inflatable one she's wearing belongs to me, but it doesn't protect her from bumping her face when she bumps into things.  However, when I asked (once again) if I could have a hard E-collar to take home, the vet tech told me that the inflatable one should be enough to protect Lexie's stitches.  I was too excited about taking Lexie home to insist or argue about it, so I didn't push the issue.  After all, I own a hard E-collar that she could wear that night, and I could always go to Dr. Ellis at Animal Care Clinic if the collar I have doesn't work out for her.

I couldn't see her repaired incisions because her head was already wrapped with bandages, but at first glance it didn't look like her wounds were oozing half as much as they were the last time I picked her up after her second surgery.  Lexie also looked like she had had a tummy tuck!  After her emergency C-section due to pyometra last summer, Lexie was left with a saggy, flabby belly.  It didn't bother me, but people would sometimes ask me if Lou had just had a litter of puppies.  Haha!  "Nope.  She's just fat."  Anyway, I'm just saying that having a mastectomy has left Lexie looking very svelte.  

As we left MedVet (hopefully for the last time), Lexie was so excited that she was swinging her head from side to side while she walked, like a little Lexie Wonder!  When I opened the car door, she recognized that sound right away and knew exactly how to climb up into the back seat all by herself.  I had her new doggy bed laying in the middle of the back seat, and she plopped right down on top of it.  I climbed into the back seat and sat behind her, but that wasn't good enough for me.  I wanted to cuddle her little face!  So, I maneuvered my way down to the other end of the back seat where Lexie's head was laying, and as soon as I sat down by her face, Lexie immediately laid her head and put her paws in my lap.  It was a total "awwwww" moment.  Then, after we got back on the road, I noticed she was shivering a little bit because the air conditioning was blowing on her.  Luckily, I had brought her favorite comforter, and so Lexie and I snuggled under the blankets during the entire three-hour ride back to West Virginia.

Once we were home, Lexie knew EXACTLY where she was, and she was so happy!  I decided to take her out to the back yard with her sisters before taking off her harness, just in case I needed to help her find her way up and down the deck steps and the back yard.  She did really well, though!  She was a tad apprehensive about going down the steps, but as soon as she found the yard she peed immediately, and then successfully made her way back up the steps and into the house without much difficulty.

When I removed Lexie's bandages, I did notice some blood (or "bloody fluid," I should say), but not nearly as much as after her last surgery.  In fact, her incisions look pretty good!  There's some swelling above her right eye, and that right incision still oozes a lot more than the left, but I think that may have something to do with the fact that her right eye has the vertical incision.

On a side note, one thing I hadn't really considered while preparing for Lexie's homecoming was the fact that Sam is now going to go through a new adjustment period, too.  This may sound awful, but Sam actually acted a little hurt or upset about Lexie being home again.  To be fair, Sam LOVES attention, but has always been perfectly content to sort of take the back seat to Lexie, who is a little more demanding about receiving attention whenever she wants it, which is just about always.  So, while Lexie was at MedVet over the past couple of weeks, Sam gradually became more and more assertive about receiving attention from me and Justin whenever SHE wanted it.  As soon as Lexie walked through the front door last night, though, it's like someone completely let the air out of Sam's tires.  She kind of curled up in the corner of the couch and pouted while everyone fussed over Lexie (Zach and Kristy came over to welcome Lexie home, too).

I do feel bad that Sam's not receiving as much one-on-one attention now that Lexie is home, but unfortunately it can't really be helped right now.  Lexie is going to need extra attention as she heals and learns how to safely navigate around the house and back yard.  Justin and I are trying to be as mindful as possible of Sam's feelings and give her extra cuddles whenever we can, but I think it's going to be a bit of a delicate juggling act with those two for a while.  (Jocie, by the way, hasn't been affected at all by anything that's been going on, but that's just Jocie.)

Anyway, after watching Lexie bump her face on a couple different things in the house, I decided to fasten the hard E-collar I had over top of the inflatable E-collar she was already wearing.  (That way, she can't pull the hard E-collar off.)  At first, Justin and I felt bad for Lexie because of all the stuff around her poor little head, but once we saw how much better the hard E-collar was protecting her from bumping her face into things, we didn't feel so bad anymore.

Unfortunately, as soon as Justin and I went upstairs to go to bed last night, Lexie managed to pull both the hard and inflatable E-collars off.  Justin discovered this when he ran back downstairs to get something.  So, we decided it might be best to sleep in the same room as Lexie for at least the first night.  Justin slept on the couch, but I chose to sleep on Lexie's new doggy bed in the floor with her (the purple pillow in that photo was mine).  Haha!   It was uncomfortable and blissful all at once, but she barely moved all night long.

When I tried to get Lexie to go out this morning, she acted like she wanted to at first, but as soon as she made it to the back door, she became very apprehensive about going outside.  I tried calling her for a while, but when that didn't work I decided to try leading her out with her harness and leash.  At first, that seemed to be working, but as soon as Lexie reached the steps, she decided she didn't want to go down them.  I told her that was fine, that she didn't HAVE to go pee right now if she wanted to hold it, but when I tried to get her to go back inside, she wouldn't budge.  In fact, I think she was a little disoriented at that point and wasn't really sure which way she was facing.  I jokingly informed Justin that Lexie was "lost on the back deck," but I knew she would figure it out eventually.  She did, but it took a LONG time for her to come back inside.

So, getting Lexie to go out to use the bathroom during the day is apparently still going to be a challenge, but I'm hoping she'll become more comfortable with that routine over time.  For now, she's sleeping a lot, but she's eating and drinking like a champ.  She's also SUPER cuddly, which you'll never hear me complain about.  In fact, as I began typing this blog post, Lexie followed the sound of my typing, found me on the couch, and did this:

:)

Blind Dobe Preparations

I know this is going to shock you guys, but last night Justin and I decided that we'd rather pick Lexie up tonight than wait until Saturday morning because we don't want to spend half the day driving to and from Ohio tomorrow.  We'd rather get home really late with her tonight so that we can have ALL day tomorrow and Sunday to hang out with her at home.  So, I'm going to pick up my Lou tonight!!!!!  

I don't know if you guys remember this commercial, where the kids are so excited about going to Disney World that they're "too excited to sweep":



Well, that was basically me this morning.  My eyes popped open around 5:00 a.m. and all I could think was, "I get to pick up my Lou today!!!"  I then proceeded to surf the Internet on my iPhone while laying in bed for the next hour and a half, Googling things like "blind dog toys" and "helping your blind dog adjust." 

We've actually been preparing for Lexie's new life as a blind dog for several weeks.  My back deck is basically just an elevated, 6-foot wide, wooden platform with two sets of four steps leading down to the back yard, but there were no railings or boundaries along the edges.  When Lexie first lost her vision, she terrified me by falling off the deck not once, but three times!  It's only about 3 feet off the ground, but that's plenty high enough for her to get hurt if she landed the wrong way.  So, building a railing for the deck became my TOP priority.  The problem is that neither I, Justin, nor any of our immediate family members are very handy. 

So, my good friend, Shane, came to the rescue!  With the help of my brother, Zach, and Zach's girlfriend, Kristy, Shane installed a railing along the edge of the deck in no time.


We decided that I should also put up some lattace along the bottom of the deck so that Lexie couldn't get lost underneath, and the steps also needed some sort of railing or boundary so that she couldn't accidentally walk off the sides.  I had gotten so caught up with Lexie's latest emergency, however, that I hadn't gotten around to purchasing the lattace and lumber yet.

Then, just a couple days ago, I came home from work to find that Shane had borrowed my house key from Zach and Kristy (they live right next door) and come over during the day to install railings on the steps and lattace underneath my deck as a surprise!  I'm telling you guys, I have the BEST friends in the ENTIRE word.  You just don't even know...

The other measures I have taken to help Lexie adjust are:

• I bought all three girls new collars with metal ID tags, which jingle a little whenever they move around.  That way, Lexie will always know where her sisters are.
• I bought elevated food bowls for the girls.  I know that it's best to feed larger dogs out of elevated food bowls anyway, but my girls are all kind of lazy and have always preferred to lay down on the floor while they ate.  Lexie was kicking and tripping over the bowls, though, so I figured it was time we got them off the floor. 
• I purchased textured outdoor doormats and placed one at the top step of the back deck and one at the bottom to help Lexie know when she needs to step up and step down.  I blocked the other set of steps off with a baby gate.
• I read online that it is good to help your blind dog establish a "home base" with a doggy bed, so I purchased one last night.  Mind you, I highly doubt Lexie will use it.  We've had doggy beds before, but Jocie was always the only one who seemed to aprpeciate them.  So, I fully expect Jocie to claim the new doggy bed as hers, too, but I thought it would be worth a shot to see if Lexie might use it when she gets home.  I'm going to have the new doggy bed in the back seat when I pick her up tonight, and hopefully she'll lay on it during the ride home.
• I know Lexie probably won't feel like playing much for the first couple weeks that she's back home, but I'm really hoping that once she's healed she'll get some of her spunk back and we can learn some new games to play together.  She loves to play tug with her stuffed animals (after she gets tired of cuddling them), so last night we bought her a Kong Wubba toy that looks like a cross between a teddy bear and an octopus and has a LOUD squeaker inside (Lexie loves to squeak her stuffed animals at us).  I also bought her a Kong ball, which has slits all around it so you can insert treats inside. I'm hoping Lexie will utilize her sense of smell to find the ball when I throw it.  This will be a new game for us, as Lexie has always prefered stuffed animals over rubber toys.  I'm hoping she'll enjoy it, though.

All in all, I feel more than ready for Lexie to come home tonight.  In fact, this is going to be the longest day EVER!!!  Come on 5:00 p.m.!!!!