Genevieve (Friday Dog Blogging)

November 10, 2006 /

Genevieve

A few weeks ago, I was petting Genevieve’s pretty face, and I noticed that she had a large bump on her jaw. What’s that? I wondered. It didn’t seem to cause her a lot of discomfort, though she did pull her head away from it when I pressed on it. That was a Saturday.

Monday, I took her to the vet. The vet wasn’t sure what it was, but was pretty sure there was going to be surgery involved. They still needed to do a biopsy, before surgery, because if the lump is cancerous, they remove much more of the area surrounding the lump, so it is much more invasive. If it was just that she had a foxtail or something stuck in her cheeck (she had several stuck up in her gums once, requiring surgery…ah, good times.), they would still have to remove it, but it would require much less cutting. So, they did a biopsy. On Wednesday, the vet phoned and said that there was no cancer (YAY!) but there were elevated levels of white blood cells, so Gen should go on anti-inflammatory drugs, then come in for surgery to remove whatever was left. But it seemed to me that the bump was getting smaller…all on its own. So I decided to wait. On Friday, they called to ask why I hadn’t come to pick up her meds, and I said that the bump was completely gone now, so anti-inflammatory drugs didn’t make sense to me. I also made an appointment for a week from that Monday, so that the doctor could check her out for herself, and make sure there was nothing left that needed to be removed.

DSCF0874
(look at the colors in her coat…isn’t she a pretty girl?)

This past Monday, I took her in, and yay! No surgery needed. No foxtail, no nothing. Seems that either she got bit/stung by a bug, causing the swelling, or she got some kind of foreign object stuck in there, which was somehow dislodged and no longer causing problems. WHEW! I can’t tell you what a relief, to not have to have our baby go under…to not have that cone bonking into our shins and making noise all night so we can’t sleep…to not have to figure out where we’re going to get $700 to PAY for such surgery. Whew again.

The upshot of all of this was that it got my lazy butt into the Vet’s office, got her a check up, a shot she was behind on, a heart worm test, and on heart worm preventative drugs. $325 later, she’s asleep, happy, on the floor. Where she belongs. 😉

DSCF0870
OK, this picture is from June. So sue me. The others aren’t new either. But she’s gorgeous anyway.

17 Comments