Monday, June 28, 2010

It Was A Ruff Week


You might have noticed that last week, except for Cupkins on Monday, I didn't post at all.

That's because I came home from work Monday to find that Lucy had broken the lock on the door normally between her and the kitchen, whenever she's alone in the house.


She usually goes with my husband during the day, but Monday he wasn't able to take her so she had to stay home while we were at work. A doctors appointment kept me from coming home at lunch to check on her- which left to her own devices all day.


Unfortunately, she went on a wild kitchen binge which included a bar and a half of baker's chocolate that she managed to take from a cabinet.

Although she seemed fine and wasn't exhibiting any signs of chocolate toxicity, because of the very large amount she ingested, we brought her to the emergency animal hospital anyway.


Armed with a list of everything she ate.
  • 9-12 oz of baker's chocolate (I'm not sure if it was a half bar or slightly less), including wrappers.
  • 1/2 loaf roasted garlic bread
  • 1/2 box of cinnamon cereal
  • 1/4 box of dog cookies
  • What was left of a tin of doggy mints
  • Can of cat treats, including some of the plastic from the can
  • Half the shells from a taco kit and the seasoning packet (the entire actual packet and it's contents incase you were wondering)
  • And last but not least, both bowls of cat food

The vet said she'd probably be sick that night, they also wanted to flush her system and monitor her for chocolate poisoning to be on the safe side.


Monday night and Tuesday morning we got updates that she was doing well. We thought she would be home by Tuesday night. Then out of nowhere, she became very ill. The vet seemed shocked at this sudden turn for the worse, calling it highly unusual; and at 12 1/2 years old we were worried that her system might not be able to bounce back.


Her breathing, blood pressure, heart and digestive system were all effected. She had a lot of treatments, up's and down's, but slowly improved all week. She was finally released from the animal hospital on Friday, but is clearly still not back to her old self. Her heart is still acting funny but that will hopefully go away over the next week or so.


You may have guessed from the fact that we have a locked door between her and the kitchen that she's done this sort of thing before. She's a sweetheart with a bit of a naughty streak. (In fact she was collapsing from low blood pressure and still managed to escape from her cage at the animal hospital). But this was by far the scariest of her escapades.


We came close to loosing her, but she bounced back and we are so relieved to have her home!

6 comments:

  1. Meg- so glad to hear that he is okay.

    suzy

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  2. Poor baby Lucy! Her and Bella are sooo similar with their naughty streaks! I hope she continues to feel better... how scary! :(

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  3. I completely understand! We have a mini schnuzer named Reuben and have rushed him to our vet several times because he 1. couldn't pee 2. ate stuff he's not supposed to do 3. was limping 4, had a tick on his bottom. He is like our son!

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  4. Oh no! Poor Lucy.... I'm so glad to hear she's okay. Give her some (gentle) belly rubs from us!

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  5. Oh, my. Poor Lucy, and Poor You - it's so stressful when a pet is very ill. I'm sending you all lots of get-well mojo. Poor doggies - they don't always know what they're getting themselves into.

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  6. Glad she is feeling a little better .. the little minx!

    My mum had a boxer dog that ate everything ... one day he ate a j-cloth (not sure if you have them in the US ,,, but they are blue and white cleaning cloths) He looked like he had a severe case of worms the day after!!

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