Over the last few days Tilley’s spay scar started to play up. It was looking good the first few days we had her and she didn’t mind us touching her belly or even the scar itself. But, this morning, an area of her scar had swollen up quite badly and she showed slight discomfort when we touched it.
After Sunday afternoon’s ‘deposit’, which was rather runny, she was clearly under the weather. She just wasn’t her normal self (normally her tail is held high, lots of wagging, and wanting to be near us). She clearly couldn’t get comfortable, held her tail low and often went to her crate and looked rather sad. She wasn’t that keen either to go out for her evening walk.
When I came down to do the the middle of the night trip to the toilet, she was out cold and very slow to get going and not keen on going out. She did a quick lap of the yarden, while I did the watering can trick, but she went straight back to her crate where sadly she did a leak before I could get in and do anything. From what we’ve read, this is most unusual as dogs don’t like to toilet where they sleep.
Quite worried, we called the vet up as soon as it opened on Monday morning and got an early appointment. The staff at the Kingsway vet’s in Skipton were so nice and caring – full marks to them. Tilley was reasonably OK to get into the car and very energetic in the vet’s waiting room, since there were people to be met and other animals to be wagged at! The vet agreed that the scar was unfortunately infected. She cut off the bit of the stitch that was sticking out and pricked a hole in the worst bit of the infected lump, without a yelp from Tilley. She really is very good. Tilley was prescribed antibiotics and we made a follow-up appointment for next week.
The vet suggested either a Cone of ShameTM or t-shirt to stop Tilley from licking or otherwise messing with the wound. We settled for the t-shirt since we were very sure that the cone would drive her nuts. We found out that she is 11.2Kg, so not a big dog at all, and the vet is pretty sure that she is near fully grown now too.
We tried to get Tilley back into the car and she wouldn’t any of it so we decided that Peli would walk her home and I would drive back and get the crate ready and go to work. After a hour’s walk home (where all the loose-lead training went right out the window) and the first installment of the antibiotics both Peli and Tilley were rather shattered! Tilley did receive lots of compliments from fellow dog-walkers on the walk, however, and she wagged (and pulled) a lot in return. She seemed to perk up during the day, and spent a happy hour knocking about her Kong and plastic bottles in exchange for kibble.
When I got home from work Tilley was spreadeagled across a cross-legged Peli and took some time to wake up and greet me. I’ve just spent 30min playing with her and her favourite toy. Hopefully she will be better for tomorrow evening as it is her first day at school – Junior doggy training.