My Tough Cookie

*warning- picture attached below, not for the sensitive*

When cookie came home, she looked quite awful. Obviously not as bad as the day of the attack, but she was still in a lot of pain, she was very nervous and all stitched, bandaged, covered, and wrapped up.

The night of her surgery that Dr discovered that the pitbull has bitten and broken a piece of her eye socket bone off. She talked to me about placing the bone back and doing a type of reconstructive surgery that typically runs 4/5 thousand or she could try reinforcing the area with a ligament. The Dr. explained to us that if cookie were to get into another fight ( she made it sound as if my cooks was running around picking fights =-]) or while rough-housing with other dogs the chances of her eye physically coming out were high. She would also be more prone to bone infections because of the missing bone. We opted to reinforce the area with the ligament and we would cross any other bridges (complications) when we came to them in the future.

The next day we went to go visit her, in hopes that she might get discharged and would get to come home. The Dr. on shift explained what our responsibilities would be if we were to take her home. She was on 2 oral and one topical medications, plus she had a pump/drain going thru the back of her neck, under her chin and around her face to help drain any fluids and blood she was retaining, that we would have to 'pump and drain' a few times a day. She had not eaten anything since she arrived at the hospital. She was actually starting to feel lighter too. That too was a concern. Many times the patients ( dogs/cats) are so scared and nervous they wont eat, little less pee and poop. My heart was aching, i couldn't leave her there another night. So we took her home.

We had to make sure that Leche (my in-laws dog) didn't bother her or try licking her, so we let them see each other when she got home, but otherwise kept them apart. She slept, and slept, and after she was woken up to get her medicine, she fell back asleep. She was extremely drowsy, shaking, and moaning constantly. She still had no appetite.

This picture really doesnt show the extent of her injuries, really. You see the gauze around her neck? She has more stitches there. The bottom of the chin is all scrapped up, she broke a nail (she was very upset about that one) she had a cartilage injury on her left ear, her inner arms and legs were scrapped and cut up and she had multiple bite marks, these were only scrapes, they didnt break skin. You also can't see just how swollen her entire left side of the face is. That net shirt? ( not wearing it by choice) was holding her drain in place. They also shaved an area, about 4x3 on her back to place a fentanyl patch for a constant release of pain medicine for the next 3-5 days.

The next 72 hours after the attack were difficult. All she would do was sleep and softly cry because she was in so much pain. We never left her side. We had a hard time giving her the pain medication because it was so bitter. Not even hiding it in peanut butter would do. She would lick the peanut butter off of the pill and spit it back out.

At one point, while watching her sleep i asked Juju if he thought we did the right thing. Not only by bringing her home, but by putting her through surgery and now the recovery. I started crying, just thinking about what she had been through and now what was ahead of her. I started thinking that perhaps i was being selfish by keeping her here if her quality of life was going to be affected because of her injuries. Thankfully juju was there to see me through my little meltdown. Its just been so hard to see her in so much pain, then juju reminds me that its only been a few days since the attack. And then it all falls back into perspective.