Size Matters

Vixen watching football after her meal.

Among my (many) concerns lately, I've actually been pretty concerned about size. No, not THAT size - we've already covered that in another blog post. I have actually been concerned about the size of my stomach post-surgery.

As the weeks have passed since surgery, Lor and I have diverged in the amounts we can eat at one sitting. Lor had made it all the way up to 4 ounces at a shot, but has regressed a little, and can now only handle about 3 ounces at once without becoming uncomfortable. I, on the other hand, can now eat somewhere between 4 to 6 ounces at one sitting, depending on the consistency of the food we are eating. I've read horror stories about people stretching their reduced stomach pouches back out to pre-surgery sizes, and I have been wondering...is this happening to me? Do I need to do a "pouch reset" involving nothing but liquid foods for a week? Or is this normal?

In the midst of this concern about growing portion sizes and slowing weight loss, I was reminded that I really have undergone some significant changes to my digestive tract. The encouragement came from a very unusual source. 

Enter our dog, Vixen.

Recently, we decided to splurge and go to Subway. We would split a footlong Spicy Italian sandwich, throw away the flatbread it came with when we got it home, and eat nothing but the deli meats and veggies. It seemed like a good plan.

Halfway through my breadless "sandwich", I realized there was no way I was going to finish my 6-inch half. Regretfully, I prepared to throw the remainder away. But, a flash of inspiration hit me - I would slice up the remainder, mix it with hard dog food, and give it to Vixen in lieu of her usual soft food when I fed her for the night! I performed my prep work, put the bowl down, and returned to watching television.

5 minutes later, Vixen came in to see if there was anything else for her to eat. Flabbergasted, I went into the kitchen with her to point out that I had just served her a delectable meal of "people food". Lo and behold, her dog dish was empty.

My 6-pound Chihuahua had just out-eaten me. She managed half my "sandwich", all her hard dog food, and was now looking for more.

If I needed confirmation that my stomach really was smaller than it had been, here it was.

The moral of the story? I need to stop over-thinking these things. From hair loss, to personal appearance, to stomach size, my mind has been ablaze with things to worry about concerning the results of my surgery. As Vixen's demonstration pointed out, everything is coming along pretty much the way it is supposed to. I just need to stay on the train, sit back, and see where the journey takes me.

Thanks, Vixen.

Wondering If Vixen Needs A Stomach Reset Now,

- Hawkwind

Going to the Dogs

My 5-pound high blood pressure generator.

Early this morning, I got up and sat myself in front of my computer. I had every intention of putting together a fabulous blog article, maybe a little something about "me vs. the scale" or something. But I could not concentrate. My thoughts went every which direction, all eventually returning to the furry, sleeping lump in the corner a few feet away from me - and her trip to the veterinarian later today. Knowing I could not write coherently in this mental condition, I gave up and wandered into the living room to watch TV, accompanied by my little friend, wagging her tail,  blissfully unaware she might be spending her last few hours on Earth.

What is it about our pets that allows them this emotional power over our lives? People go absolutely crazy for these furry little bundles of neurotic activity, spending an astonishing amount every year on them - more than 60 Billion in the USA alone last year. They are our surrogate children, our best friends, our confidantes - sometimes the one source of reliable emotional support in our lives. "Love Me Like Me Dog Does" was the desire voiced by C/W artist Billy Currington a few years back, and I totally get where he was coming from. My relationships with people tend to have ups and downs. My relationship with Vixen is pretty much a constant positive reinforcement of my self-image: she seems to think that I am one of the twin pillars that hold up the Universe. (Lor is the other one, of course. That's OK. I suppose I can share.)

And, for weeks now, my fuzzy ego-reinforcer has been in pain every time she goes to the potty. We have tried different diets, we have tried supplements, we have tried prescriptions, and nothing works. Every day, come "potty time" she screams as if we are shoving red-hot pokers into her, until she is finally done. She then ambles away, unconcerned, leaving us traumatized and wondering how we can take care of this - how can we keep her from suffering?

It finally got to be too much, and we scheduled her with our local low-income veterinarian. (And, may I say here, thank God for places like Albuquerque Humane Society.) We knew full well that this might be a blockage in her intestines. A tumor in her abdomen. A tear somewhere along her digestive tract that might not be fixable with our limited resources. Even the amount we were going to use to pay for her office visit today was already budgeted for something else - a major surgery today would be completely out of our reach, and could leave us with the decision to have to euthanize our 6-pound supermodel. The thought of her leaving us forever, of coming home from the vet's office without her, was almost too much to bear.

We had a very tense and terrifying visit to the vet. We explained the problems, winced when the exam made her cry, felt vaguely guilty that we had not done something else that would have prevented us from coming to this point. And now, after all is said and done, we have medications to give her, even more instructions on dietary changes, and we have a major surgical procedure that we have to schedule and figure out how to pay for.  And yet, when we left the office and put her back in the car, we looked at one another and both breathed a sigh of relief . It felt like a disaster, narrowly averted.

She is asleep in the corner now, worn out from her stressful day. I could very easily curl up beside her and share that stress recovery. We now face a daily regimen of pills, a major financial headache, and an uncertain outcome - we still don't know if any of this is going to work.

But, still, none of this seems like too much to do, in the name of keeping our dog healthy and pain-free. The relationships with our pets are too valuable to be tossed away casually. Dean Koontz said it best: "No matter how close we are to another person, few human relationships are as free from strife, disagreement and frustration as is the relationship you have with a good dog."

Couldn't have said it better myself.

Relieved and Thankful,

- Hawkwind