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Saturday, February 18, 2012

#Boy

Some Background:

1. I found him on Christmas Eve last year, in the middle of the road with its front hinge leg broken and   fractured bone exposed.
2. He undergoes ESF(external skeletal fixation) surgery.
3. He's in his seventh week of recovering from surgery now.
4. I "deposited" him at Uncle Tony's house.

Thus far, this is what I can tell about this dog:

To welcome: When me or Mei Yee arrived at Uncle Tony's house, he'll be in his very excited state, waving his tail, jumping and hopping around, keep on smelling our scent. He'll even stand on two back legs only, giving us his two front leg. But the problem is, when he did that the first time, I'm terrified, because the broken leg is still with the pins, metals, bandage and all. But he keeps doing that, standing up with two back legs only, then only I felt kinda relieved also, it shows the broken bone is healing well. There is this one time where he jumped up with two front legs up, and the broken leg (with the pins, metal, bandage) IS HOOKED to the back of uncle Tony's car, and I'm like "OH NOES!!", but he was able to get it down on ground seconds later, phew~~

His toilet habits:
Pee: He will only pee outside, unless he has hold it really really long that he can't hold any more , then only will he pee at the car porch. It solely depends on how long he's been inside the porch. He clearly shows that he needs a toilet break by going near the gate. If he's been holding for some time and he urgently needs to pee and I arrived, he'll take it as a granted permission to pee inside the house. Because sometimes I need to put my stuff away , get the leash, so I couldn't bring him out once I arrived at the gate, he'll pee by the edge of the gate, then I just need to spray some water to wash it down the drain.

Poo: According to Mei Yee, when boy is boarding at the vet clinic, he generally poo 3 times when bring him for walk, at 3 different spots. Thus far, the record, minimum is din poo at all whole day, maximum is poo 4 times a day. Currently we're trying to cut down the number of times of bringing him for a walk to train him poo 1 times. Once we bring him for walk, high chances is that he'll poo. Never did he poo inside the house other than the first day when he just arrived at the house. Because he's a stray before this, he'll kick the sand or stone after he had poo, sort of want to "cover up" his poo. But now I clean up his poo, so he'll wait by the side as I pack it up.

His dietary: He needs to partake 3 different medicine each day. So the vet had showed us how to fed him medicine by opening his mouth, with the hand holding the pill, put the hand halfway trough his throat, close his mouth, and move the pill down his throat. We have tried, failed! So another way suggested by vet is hide it in canned food. So we did. At the beginning, we gave him kibbles, then on top of the kibbles, we put the canned food with medicine in it, he'll eat it CLEAN. But after some time, he began to love CANNED food, and din touch kibbles at all. We're like, "oh No's, he is going to be choosy with his food now." To solve that, we don't give him canned foot, but just give him kibbles, he din eat much at first, but slowly he picked up eating kibbles again. No canned food, how to feed him medicine? This is solved by Uncle Tony very successful attempt, by hiding it in a lump of peanut butter jam! Boy loves peanut butter jam! Haha. Take peanut butter jam with my finger, then hide medicine in it, then must not slowly let him lick, if we do so, he'll leave out the medicine (which sometimes he did too with canned food), so must stuck the lump onto his tongue first then only let him lick the remaining on my finger, mostly can be rest assured that the lump containing the medicine is down his throat already. He has a very good posture when he's hungry or he wants food., he'll be sitting down, with his tongue out, and wait for me patiently to prepare his food. And when I gave him the food, he won't just focus on eating only, he'll still takes his heads up and see where am I. And he won't rush for his food unless he is really really hungry. One time I put his food on the bench, he have not eaten whole day, still he let me feed him his medicine first, then as I washes my hands, he eat from the bowl of food on the bench, which is kinda hard for him, because he is wearing the cone, then only I faster go get the bowl of food down on the ground. After fed him some food, and if he's still not full enough and wants more food, he'll have that very good posture of asking food again, sitting down and tongues licking out, but its definitely OK if don't feed him again, after some waiting, he'll go another corner and lie down.

His barking: He'll only bark, bark loudly, on this one and only occasion, that is when me or Mei Yee leave him. And these are the times my heart sank. Other than this occasion, He is as silent as a mute.

His growling: He'll growl at cats, he don't like cats. He'll growl at other dogs also. One time when we brought him to the vet clinic, there's kinda war between him and the Doberman. Scary. Needs to block his sight from the Doberman and pacify him. That time I caress his ear until he nearly fall asleep, then woke up because is our time to see the vet, after waiting like 2 hours or so.

His whimpering: He'll only whimper if he's in pain. Level of whimpering = Level of pain.

Recent updates: Just re-bandage him today, I think this is the third time we're doing this ourselves, definitely not an easy task. Especially taking out the bandage part, need to deal with bandage that sticks to the metal due to discharge. But the time we took to change his bandage is getting shorter, practice makes perfect! Going to bring him see the vet next Monday, to take out another 2 pins.


That's all. Cheers! =)




Love,
Lee Xiang.