On infected knee

Sometimes, when things are busy and emotional, its tough to post here. Time doesn't always allow it, and sometimes I'm just emotionally drained.

And sometimes its bad luck.

Yesterday, I post about Duke and kinda how we are almost out of the woods. Then today the Veteroo tells me that Duke has a medicine-resistant form of bacteria growing in his knee (of course he does). Only one medicine on their shelves can knock it out. The pills cost $5. Not too bad, I'm thinking. He'll need 11 pills. Ok, that hurts, but all things considered... what is that you say, that's per day? For 2 weeks?

Reread those last few sentences. I edited it twice to make sure it was right and I wasn't confusing anything.

$5 x 11 x 14 = bankruptcy.

Only Duke. He's one of the happiest, most obedient, fun-loving, eager to please dogs you'll ever know, but if something can go wrong with him, it will. I'm convinced that he's from a bad breeder. One of those breeding farms. I'll never buy another dog from the place we got him, and I'll probably never buy another dog period (rescue, yes; purchase, no).

To finish this story: I think the vet took pity on me, because she's writing me a script for human medicine for Duke that is supposed to work according to the charts.

I've read that no blog post is complete without pictures of dogs, so here is Duke during happier times:

On bended knee

So two Mondays ago, Duke had an appointment to see his surgeon because his repaired knee was bothering him. He had begun limping again and really favoring the knee and an X-ray showed advancing arthritis.

So the surgeon took out the titanium staples (which had been pulled out of place) and elastic bands (one of which ripped) he installed last year. The hope being that the foreign bodies were bothering the knee. The knee was now supported by scar tissue so it was fine.

Or at least it was until Duke tore out or overworked the stitched area. That was a fun find: We came down to go to dinner Friday night to find blood on the floor. No problem, quick trip to the vet, one stitch and some liquid skin and its all fixed up.

Till next morning, when I come down to blood soaked fur below the wound. So I schedule an afternoon appointment.

And good thing I did, because by the time I got Duke there, the wound, all 3 or so inches of it, had opened up and no stitches held it closed. You could see into his leg. If you know how much I love my dog, you know it was kind of traumatic. Kind of.

So that's where we've been over the last week or so. The stitches come out early next week, at which time, hopefully, this ordeal will be over.