On Sunday evening, Emma was feeling great. After her dinner, which she ate heartily, she went outside with Daniel to do her 'business'. When she was finished, she trotted up the deck stairs, and she bounced into the house ... undeniable evidence that she was having a good day.
Monday morning, Emma was obviously in pain. She yelped whenever she shifted position on her bed. At times, she just stood with her head hanging, panting with her mouth open, clearly distressed. My veterinarian told me to bring her right over, and they would look at her between appointments. Over the course of three hours, they poked and prodded her, x-rayed just about everywhere, and determined that she had somehow injured her neck.
I brought Emma home, high on pain killers and a muscle relaxant, and she slept for most of the afternoon. At dinnertime, she refused to eat. I had to coax her to eat some stinky canned food so I could give her her pills (which cannot be taken on an empty stomach). The pills made her loopy and confused, so I slept on the couch in the family room to be near her.
This morning, she again refused to eat. No food + No pills = PAIN, so I cooked chicken and rice ... which she ate, thank goodness. Right now, she is sleeping and she hasn't yelped in a couple of hours.
We have an acupuncture appointment for Emma on Thursday. This should make her much more comfortable, but the one-hour car ride to get there sometimes stresses her. It's a balancing act. Is the stress worth the relief that the acupuncture provides? I'm going to give it a shot because I think it's what she needs right now.
Whenever greyhounds limp or are in such pain, especially older greyhounds, we always fear bone cancer (osteosarcoma). X-rays confirm that we have none of this with Emma, thank Heaven. She has two calcified disks in her lumbar spine, which we already knew about, and everything else on her x-rays shows a dog who is in much better condition than her number of birthdays would indicate.
As I sat on the floor of the exam room with Emma, not knowing what was causing her pain, feeling helpless, I kept pushing thoughts from my head. Would THIS be the trip when we have to say goodbye? It wasn't. (audible sigh of relief)
Such is life with an old, old dog. Every day is a gift. I make an effort to cherish the good days, I work through the bad ones, and I am thankful that there are more good days than bad right now ... and I try to make every day the best day it can be.
(all of the photos in this post were taken as Emma and I sat on the floor waiting to see the vet. She was pretty drugged.)
