Dog + Rocks = Not Good

Have I ever mentioned that I love my dog? I mean, I adore that beast with all my heart. Ever since I started working from home about a year ago, he has become my constant companion and shadow. He is great. A bit spaztic and hyper, yes, but he makes up for it with his unwavering love and devotion. He makes me wish I was human being who was that committed to pure and unadulterated love of everything. (except he's not a fan of squirrels and doves and cats...)

We have been having some minor work done to our house which is really annoying and disruptive and unnerving for our spaztic, hyper dog, so we have been sending him to day care whilst the house is getting its little face lift. Drop him off at 7am, let him run wild to release his inner beast, and pick him up again in the afternoon, when the crew wraps up for the day.

This has been going swimmingly. We thought. When I drop him off, he is so excited to go inside and play with his pals that he doesn't even look back to say "Bye, mom" when I walk / get pulled through the front door. Zoom. He's gone. But he's equally as happy to see me when I pick him up in the afternoon, so all is forgiven and we have the happiest reunions ever. Every day this happens. I love it.

I think we may have overstepped our drop-off, pick-up, reunion boundaries when we not only put him in daycare, but also boarded him for the weekend when we went to Tahoe (see below post about crazy chipmunk encounter). We pick him up on Sunday to the same routine as always:

Us: "Hi, Max, old buddy, old pal!"
Max: "Hey! You came back! Whoopie! I'll jump up on you so that I can lick your face!"

And all is right with the world.

Except we get home and feed him dinner. He doesn't eat. "Huh?" we think. Max not eating? "Maybe he ate just before we picked him up," I suggest. "Maybe he's just really tired," the husband contingent surmises. We shrug our shoulders and carry on.

Monday morning. Didn't eat breakfast. Weird, odd, and worrisome. But he certainly had no issues with scarfing down the handful of dog biscuits I was handing out in lieu of breakfast, so perhaps I'm just being paranoid.

Monday night. Runs through the door straight to his bowl and inhales every last morsel of food in his bowl. "PHEW," I thought. Now we're talking. Max is normal and all is right with the world.

Until early Tuesday morning. I wake to the sound of Max vomiting so I leap out of bed and find 9 (NINE) decent sized rocks in a pile on the floor. Are you kidding me? NINE rocks?

I take Max out of daycare. I call the vet. I watch him like a hawk. I call the vet. Max doesn't really move all day. Highly out of character for my dear boy. I worry. I call a different vet. I get an appointment.

Max goes in to the vet's office and suddenly springs back to life. "Oh great," I think. "I am just one of those paranoid worry warts. Max is fine."

Vet inspects him and says "I should X-ray his stomach to make sure there were only 9 rocks in there. Is that okay?" Like I'm gonna say no. Off Max goes to the back room for further inspection. 20 minutes pass. The vet comes out.

"I don't know how, but we got really, really lucky," she says. "He has 8 more rocks in his colon." EIGHT rocks. But thank goodness they made it to his colon (apparently), because the rocks were somehow able to pass through part of the stomach that they shouldn't have been able to.

Who the hell eats 17 rocks? And how the hell does someone not notice a dog eating those 17 rocks?

All I know is that my poor, sweet dog is suffering, and I believe it is because he was a lot more stressed about the daycare situation that I would have ever thought. He is okay for now, but he is still not great.

But I suppose it's really hard work to pass EIGHT rocks through your body, so I'll continue to watch him like a hawk and hope he poops 'em out tomorrow morning.

I never, ever, ever thought I would be up for inspecting dog poop. But tomorrow I will.

I love this dog with my whole heart, and I really need him to be okay tomorrow.