My husband and I don't have any children. I never felt "ready" for them until about a year ago. Unfortunately, that is exactly when all my medical issues started, forcing us to delay any efforts towards procreation. That places our poor little dog (a 20 lb, white fluffy mutt) into being our "kid". He is an "only dog" (I know, very rare for a veterinarian to have only 1 pet), and he has been known to be a little bit of a brat sometimes. I think it's similar to how a preacher can sometimes have the worst behaved kids in the church.
Anyway, we have a fenced-in yard. The weather has been lovely recently (mid-60's), so our dog has been getting plenty of opportunity to enjoy the outdoors. On Thursday, I let him play outside while I knitted in the living room. I left the main door open with just the screen in place. Suddenly, I smelled something wretched. It was just terrible; like something died. I looked up to see my dog grinning at me outside the screened door. I smelled him; I gagged. Yes, the stink was coming from him. Immediately, I gave him a bath (which he hates). Looking outside, I could not find the source of the odor. That night, I tried to describe to my husband the extent of the horrible smell. My husband did not look impressed.
Friday, I was smarter. I put the dog outside and watched. Sure enough, beside the large tree in our back yard, he starts rolling on the ground. Again, I can smell him before I even get close to him. Under the dog, I find a seriously decomposing rat. That night, my husband was greeted by me holding the rat up to his face. "Smell this!" I instructed, "and tell me that it is horrible!" My husband does one better: he goes outside and finds a second rat, also by the tree and even more putrid than the first one.
Now, this is when I start to get worried. Two dead rats. Why is this happening? Our dog cannot catch a piece of popcorn thrown in the air; we seriously have difficulty believing that he is skilled enough to hunt rats, even if he is a terrier mix. My husband starts assessing and digging into the ground, thinking that maybe there is a system of tunnels running under our constantly wet back yard. I worry that if my uncoordinated dog is catching mice, maybe they are disabled in some way, such as from ingesting rat poison. This is a scary idea. Many people do not know this, but many rodenticides are highly toxic to pets. One form prevents the clotting of blood. I have seen little dogs bleed to death (in the vomit, into the lungs, out the colon) from ingesting this toxin. Furthermore, most of these are delayed-acting, in order to ensure that all rats eat the bait. (The smart rat would avoid the rodenticide if it noted all of its buddies lying in a dead pile next to the rat bait, if the toxicity were fast acting). In theory, my dog could be finding rats slowed by rodenticide, eat them over a period of 2 weeks, and then start to show clinical signs of the toxicity and die later. My dog was carted to one of my vet clinics and his clotting times were checked. All normal.
Three days later, and I am preparing to take the dog in to the clinic to have follow-up laboratory work to continue to check his blood clotting values. My husband gives me a call from work. "Maybe," he says, "we should be looking up..." I walk outside to the spot where the dead rats were found and "look up". Sure enough, a giant bird nest sits in the tree, directly over where the dead rats were found. Yes, my dog is a stink rolling opportunistic. No rat poison concerns.
Josie
The Numbers: December 12, 2011. Food: Breakfast: Trader Joe's Oatmeal Cereal and coconut milk. Snack: Carrots. Lunch: Arnold's Honey Wheat Bread and peanut butter. Snack: Christmas Cookies. Dinner: Oatmeal, blue berries (new food!). Dessert: Mint Oreos, Vanilla Wafers, carrots. Sour cream based cupcake.
Medications: Pyridium TID, Amitriptyline SID, Zyrtec SID, Cosamin, Free Fatty Acids, 2 Advil at 9 pm
Pain: Today would be Day 1 of cycle, although it seems to be "struggling". Bladder/urethra a 2-3 all day, a 4 (from 9-11pm, Advil and TENS seemed to help. Vulvodynia about a 2.
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