20 April 2011

Oliver's Recovery

Oliver, modeling his donut pillow. A wonderful alternative to the cone. This one is the Kong Cloud collar. He's tolerating it pretty well. We practiced for several days before the surgery. Short times, loads of praise and high-value treats made it all worthwhile. By the night before his surgery, he even fell asleep on his side wearing it.
The vet was pleased with his surgery yesterday. They were able to remove all the lumps and are sending them for testing, but he seemed positive that everything would be alright. He did say Oliver has a high likely hood of getting more of these fatty lumps in the future. Yeah. We kind of figured that.

They removed a hardened piece of earwax from his eardrum and we are hopeful that it was the cause of all his ear problems over the past few months.

And finally, his teeth got a cleaning and are now pearly white. Oli says more butcher bones will help keep his teeth clean. And truly, a $1 bone from the butcher does a better job than any of the expensive teeth cleaning chewies on the market.

The vet techs said he was a very good patient. He was very cooperative and sweet.


Here he is today, fast asleep, recovering from yesterday. He has six shaved spots, one from the IV and the other five have stitches where they removed the lumps.

He was happy to be home with us last night. Even happier to finally get some water and small meals. He's been so good that we haven't even had to use the special collar!

13 April 2011

Ever Wonder What Oliver Looks Like Under All That Hair?

Here is my hairy golden retriever. He normally look like this, or even more hairy. But, he is having surgery next week to have a few lumps removed (nothing to worry about!) And those lumps are difficult to find under all that hair. We definitely don't want to put him through surgery only to miss one, so we took him to the groomer to get an extreme summer haircut. Now he looks like this.
Can you believe that's the same doggie? You can really see the yellow lab in him. He looks so skinny! In fact, he lost 2 pounds!