Doggie Trauma

I an really not interested in doing my Legal Writing homework right now. Instead, I'm going to tell you about the extra excitement we've had here this weekend.

Brandon's sister Chelsea was in town Thursday night for work, so she stayed the weekend to visit. On Friday, Brandon was working, so I picked her up and we ran to Chapel Hill so I could get my hair cut. The Aveda Institute is wonderful and very, very affordable. They even give you a mini facial when they do your shampoo. Next weekend I'm going back to get my hair colored. My appointment is going to be on my birthday, and when I told Clarissa, the stylist, she wrote it down so she could remember to bake something for me! I think it would be a little crazy if she actually did, but you all know how much I love my birthday, so I wouldn't turn it down. Anyway, Chelsea hung out while I got my hair cut; then we headed home to meet up with Brandon.

After giving the tour of the new house, we were all sitting around catching up and talking about where we'd go to dinner. Brandon was petting Maddie and happened to notice that she had been chewing at her tail. Maddie is a pretty rough and tumble pup. She gets little nicks and scrapes all the time. It is usually no big deal, but she wouldn't let us anywhere near this one. I had to hold her down while Brandon looked at it, and even then he could only tell that it was dark and looked bloody. She would walk two steps, stop, chew at her tail, walk two more steps and then stop again. It was only4:30, so we called the vet, and they said to bring her in just in case.

Maddie and I got the vet and waited a while. Maddie's a really friendly dog, and she loves everyone at the vet's. So, we talked to the receptionist, met a couple of other dogs coming in and out, and waited. When they took us into the exam room, they lifted her on the table. They held her still to look at the tail and said that it might be a spider bite. They sent me out front to wait and took her in the back to give her a shot for the pain and to shave her tail. I could hear her crying while I waited.

They came out and told me that it was probably a spider bite, possibly a brown recluse. It had probably only happened that morning or the night before, and she'd been chewing at it and making it worse. The center had a big section of necrotic skin, skin that had died from the venom. (I won't link you to pictures of brown recluse bites or necrotic skin because they are is pretty gruesome. Go look them up, if you're curious.) She said that, since the bites usually necrotise down into the body instead of out to the surrounding skin, and there isn't far down to go in the tail area, the wound had probably already hit nerve, which was why Maddie was in such sever pain. They brought her back out front, and she couldn't move her tail without crying. Even after the painkiller shot, just the movement of air on the wound was hurting her. They fit her with a cone collar and sent us home with two doggie pain prescriptions and a strong antibiotic. The cone is to keep her from chewing at it and making it worse. The vet told me that she had seen dogs who had chewed their tails completely off from something like this.

Maddie cried off and on most of the night on Friday as the pain medication kicked in and wore off. By yesterday, she was much better. She seemed more bothered by the cone than the wound. Today, she is even better, but the wound still looks terrible. I need to clean the it, but I have to wait for Brandon to get home; she still won't let me near it.

Here's a picture of Maddie being cute in her satellite cone. Below that I'll post a picture of the wound, so don't scroll past the first picture if you don't want to see it.









Pictures of the nectotizing spider bite wound below.



You've been warned.