Rocky's Specialist Update

[Chicklette]

As some of you know Rocky had one eye removed. Some are following this if not to make a long story short, her lens popped back and one day woke up totally blind, her pupils were fully dilated, the next day she had to have it removed. So now we are trying to save her other eye. I put three different kinds of drops in her eyes 7 times a day.

Anyway, the specialist we go to is about 3 to 4 hours away, LONG trip. But he’s the best. Well the update is not good. They do this pressure reading, the normal range is about 20. Last times it was 28, now it was 35. He said don’t panic yet. But she IS having more trouble and is going more and more blind. He said she is not in any pain right now. We have to go back in three months as usual and keep up with the drops. He said if her eye looks blue or gray to bring her in right away or if she is having problems.

I am teaching her commands so when she does go blind she will understand these commands. But threw all this she is such a happy dog, nothing gets her down, nothing seems to bother her. I truly admire that dog. I love her so much and would do anything for her.

She is so bad at the vets though; she hates all other dogs and constantly barks, lol. But she knows this is a place she doesn’t want to be. But she is so good getting her eyes tested on the table.

But for now she can see a bit, that is our goal, to keep her seeing as long as possible and keeping her pain free. She will go blind, it’s just a matter of time. I just wish she didn’t have to go threw all this. My other dog, Jack is fine. I took her to since they are sisters and she’s okay.

Here are some pics and we saw some Buzzards. I took some pics of them.

 

[Vicious_Fish]

My parents have a Jack Russell Terrier who's blind in his one eye. He deals with his handicap pretty well at 12 years old. They're not exactly sure how it happened but he's a very active hunter and they think he stabbed it while running though some brush chasing a groundhog. It was never removed but now he has one normal eye and one creepy blue eye, lol.

 

[Lissaspence]

Dogs are amazingly resiliant. Even when she does go blind I'm sure she'll be fine. I know what you mean though when you say you hate for her to have to go through it. My little terrier mix has an immune disorder and got really sick and no one could figure out what was wrong with him. I thought we were going to loose him. He lost a ton of weight (was basically a walking skeleton), would barely move and when he did he would randomly just fall over and not be able to get back up and he would have seizures. It REALLY sucks to watch them suffering and not be able to do anything about it. But in the end all it took was a daily dose of prednisone to fix him once they figured out what was wrong and $5k later that is. Now he's back to his bouncy self, a bit fatter from the steroids but doing good.

 

[Wet Whiskers]

You know, after working for years in the veterinary field, I will swear to you that dogs deal 1,000x's better than we do with this stuff. Yeah, they hate being at the vet, and the pain is no fun, but they deal with the aftermath really well. I've seen very happy pups with all sorts of 'problems' as we would define them: missing legs, broken backs, no eyes, no teeth, deaf, missing half their nose, bald, royally scarred up, etc. For them, it just is. They aren't worried about the future implications or why it happened once its over, but rather they work to make do in that moment, and usually succeed quite well. I have no doubt that no matter what, Rocky will just end up showing you all the other strengths that she has. My mom's dog ended up going blind and deaf, but could not have been a happier little girl. She just ended up following her nose and feeling the vibrations in the floor. They can startle a little more easily, but as long as they feel like they have a loving, stable home, they do awesome. Luckily, she's obviously set. I suspect this is most likely harder on you, and do however hope you enjoy the extra bonding time you will get with her during the new training.

 

[Chicklette]

Dogs are amazingly resiliant. Even when she does go blind I'm sure she'll be fine. I know what you mean though when you say you hate for her to have to go through it. My little terrier mix has an immune disorder and got really sick and no one could figure out what was wrong with him. I thought we were going to loose him. He lost a ton of weight (was basically a walking skeleton), would barely move and when he did he would randomly just fall over and not be able to get back up and he would have seizures. It REALLY sucks to watch them suffering and not be able to do anything about it. But in the end all it took was a daily dose of prednisone to fix him once they figured out what was wrong and $5k later that is. Now he's back to his bouncy self, a bit fatter from the steroids but doing good.

Poor baby, Im glad you figured out what it was before it was too late. It's very hard watching an animal go threw something like this and not be able to stop it but your right they are resiliant, Im just so happy you figured out what was wrong with your puppy.

But I bet that doesn't stop him.

You know, after working for years in the veterinary field, I will swear to you that dogs deal 1,000x's better than we do with this stuff. Yeah, they hate being at the vet, and the pain is no fun, but they deal with the aftermath really well. I've seen very happy pups with all sorts of 'problems' as we would define them: missing legs, broken backs, no eyes, no teeth, deaf, missing half their nose, bald, royally scarred up, etc. For them, it just is. They aren't worried about the future implications or why it happened once its over, but rather they work to make do in that moment, and usually succeed quite well. I have no doubt that no matter what, Rocky will just end up showing you all the other strengths that she has. My mom's dog ended up going blind and deaf, but could not have been a happier little girl. She just ended up following her nose and feeling the vibrations in the floor. They can startle a little more easily, but as long as they feel like they have a loving, stable home, they do awesome. Luckily, she's obviously set. I suspect this is most likely harder on you, and do however hope you enjoy the extra bonding time you will get with her during the new training.

Your right, it's like they get an operation and we are trying to ca;m them down and when we get one we are in bed for weeks, lol. When Rocky got her eye removed she wanted to play kong outside when we got home. I mean she just got her eye removed. I took her to bed. But they do handle things better then us, they adapt to change better and seem to do it without a care in the world. It's hard watching my baby go blind but I know she will be fine when she does. It's still hard watching.

 

[knifegill]