Weekend Adventures: Volunteer & Sick Pup

I signed up to be a volunteer for Maddie's Fund to help animals in need of a forever home. This weekend there was an adoption event at the Stoneridge Mall (as well as a bunch of other places, like Petco). The nice thing about volunteering for Maddie's Fund is that the coordinator sends out activities for that week that needs volunteers, and you can decide which ones you would like to attend (if any). They are very flexible and understanding of your other commitments, which works perfectly for me.

I decided to help out on Saturday, and I was a one on one volunteer with a Chi-Terrior mix named Brandi. She was the classic lap dog. Literally, all I did was sit in a chair and had her on my lap as people came by to pet her and ask questions. Brandi is such a chill dog. She reminded me of an old dog who is so mellow all she wants to do is sleep. But Brandi was only 2 years old! She, along with another dog (Reggie, a Wire Hair Terrior) and 6 other kittens are in a foster home together, and they were all at the adoption event with a couple other cats from a different foster.

A lot of people were just there to pet the cute animals and look. Some people asked me for medical advice for their dog, and another asked me how to get involved with volunteering. It was a fun day even though only 1 cat got adopted. Hopefully soon these animals will find a forever home.

When I got home on Saturday, Luna and I went to the dog park and had our usual amount of fun. We came back to our apartment and chilled until Drew came home and we made dinner. That night, Luna had the runs so we decided to put her on the "No Food Diet" for 24 hours to try to give her digestive system a break.

Basically, all of Sunday Luna and I were couch potatoes. Not moving around very much, and just relaxing. She slept all day, with the exception of a couple spurts of energy when her dad came home from work. Hopefully her "cleanse" has worked, I guess we will see how she does today. If she doesn't get better I might have to take her to the vet.

Read More

Waking Up to Strange Noises

With Luna's track record lately, she's been getting into a lot of trouble in the middle of the night when Drew and I are sleeping. So when I woke up this morning at 4:30 to weird noises, I knew it had to have been Luna.

On Saturday, at the Ice Cream Social, I bought a knuckle bone from Pet Food Express. Luna has been in love with it! Chewing off the outside layer that looks like it was marinated in something disgusting. Drew can't stand the smell of it (not going to lie, it smells pretty awful).

Now that it's been a couple days, Luna has passed the outer layer and has been chewing off pieces of this knuckle bone. I'm not sure if that's normal and that its just a softer bone so it's easier to actually destroy, but she's definitely been doing it.

Here's a picture of what the bone looks like right now:

Over the past couple days, Luna has been pretty constipated, but still passing things. (Warning this may get slightly gross and graphic—skip to the next paragraph if you don't want to read about her poop). When she did poop, it was a weird color and texture. it almost looked like poop that had been sitting there for a couple weeks: dry and really really light in color (almost white). But this wasn't every time she pooped, maybe once a day it looked like that. And I wasn't too concerned because at least she is passing things, she's not clogged somewhere.

After speculating, I came to the conclusion that her knuckle bone that she had been eating was not digesting, and that's what I was seeing in her stool. (Yes, a good dog mom pays close attention to her pup's stool).

So this morning, in the wee hours of the day, I heard strange noises. I've heard these noises before. The sound of Luna's diaphragm convulsing. Not a good sound to hear. I try to figure out where she is and get her onto the tile ASAP! But by then, it was too late. She vomitted under the bed. I woke up Drew so he could keep her back from eating the throw up, but Luna wasn't moving. I think she probably thought she would get in trouble (which she would not be). I got the supplies and picked everything up and cleaned up. I did more speculating, and to cut out some details, I knew it had to do with that knuckle bone.

I think we are going to throw that thing away. Gross.

Read More