On Monday, Blondie Bear spent the day at the doggie hospital to have two small growths removed from her skin. Neither were cancerous, but one was on the edge of her eye lid and was impairing her vision. As long as she was to be sedated to remove that, we decided to have a skin tag on her shoulder removed as well.

While waiting for the veterinarian staff to bring Blondie out after surgery and recovery, the surgical assistant told me a funny story about Blondie. Blondie is a big, sturdy girl, but gentle as can be. They gave her the pre-surgical anesthesia to relax her. After a few minutes they moved her to the surgical table, but when they tried to get Blondie Bear to lay down, she braced her legs out wide and stiffened up, “I will NOT lie down, and you can’t make me.” there was no aggression at all, just stalwart resistance. They could not budge her, so they waited.

A few moments later her head started to droop and they moved in to support her so she would not fall off the table. She slumped down onto the table, defeated.

The surgery went well.

The receptionist told me she walked through the recovery area as Blondie was coming out of the anesthesia and she was sitting up, with an oxygen mask just hanging off her nose. She laughed and said, “How many dogs do you see who will let you hang a mask on their nose and they’ll leave it here?”

When they brought Blondie out front to me, she engaged four-paw-low gear and dragged Amanda right past me as she powered to the door, “I want OUT of here!”

She came out with an e-collar (cone of shame) to keep her from rubbing at her eye with a fore paw: that could snag the sutures and rip her eyelid open again. Getting her in behind the seats of our pick-up was a task, but with Amanda’s help we accomplished it. Once Blondie got settled in a central position she rode fine, but there was some thrashing about in involved in getting to that point.

It’s Thursday today and she is recovering well. But getting used to wearing a cone was a trial.

She hates the collar, but it has to stay. However, maybe we could do better.

The cone was so long it constantly dragged on the ground, and it made eating and drinking impossible. I cut 1½ inches off the outer edge of the cone. That helped. Now she could set the cone over a food dish and eat and we could put water in her dish so she could drink between meals.

It also did not drag the ground if she held her head way up while walking. This is not her natural pose – wouldn’t be for most dogs – she likes to sniff the ground as she walks. But it was still so uncomfortable she could not rest. Marie tried tucking a small pillow under her chin when she laid down, but that had to be redone each time she shifted position – which was often.

On Monday evening she whimpered a lot because of pain, so I gave her some baby aspirin to help her get to sleep.

Marie ordered her a Comfy Cone e-collar and had it rushed in. We swapped the cones Wednesday evening. This collar is made of a synthetic fabric, not hard plastic and it’s padded. It’s more flexible and much less distracting because of sounds echoing around. Try walking around with your head in a bucket for a while, you’ll see.

Wednesday night she slept through the night for the first time, and we credit this collar for that. It even has a reflective edge to help see it in low light conditions.

Blondie’s incisions are healing well. I put ointment on them twice a day, and I put hydrocortisone on the shaved patch on her shoulder several times a day to ease the itching that comes with healing and hair growing back in. She is resting easier, moving around better and is again sleeping by my chair as I work, so she has forgiven me for taking her to that place where horrible things were done.

Volt and Cochise helped out too. For the first couple of days one or the other of them were right by her side all the time.

We go back in another week to have the stitches removed and see that everything is healing as it should. We expect to be done with the cone at that time. That will make Blondie VERY happy!