Saturday, March 10, 2012

Our Sweet, Precious Bo

If you know us at all, you know our little (huge) puppy (4 year old) dog Bo is our family and child and life. He is the most loving and wonderful dog. Well let me preface with saying he is perfectly fine and healthy now. But the other night we had a horrible experience.

Sweet little Bo was in the kitchen with us as usual when we are listening to music and cooking and he must have eaten something. Before we knew it, Bo was scooting over to us with his front legs rigid and held together at the ankles and his mouth completely swollen shut. He was in some sort of allergic reaction (although we didn't know this at that moment). He was doing some sort of choking coughing sound and we knew he was having trouble getting any air. David held him while I ran and found some Benadryl and called our emergency vet (we LOVE our vet!). David could barely get Bo's little mouth open enough to get a pill in and then tried to get some water down while I cried and waited for the vet to call back, thinking that my dog was dying in David's arms.

I know, I know, you might think this is all very dramatic....and, if you do, you can stop reading my blog now. Chances are you have never met Bo, or you have never owned a dog as your best friend, or you don't know me at all and we don't have much in common.

Now back to the story. In the time you took to read that paragraph, Bo was better. The swelling was going down and he could begin moving his legs. The vet called me back in time for Bo to be back to normal.

I have to say, those few minutes shook me up for the next days. I couldn't stand that we almost lost him so quickly and so helplessly. It was a horrible experience and I don't think I will ever forget Bo's scared little face. Or David's.

So that you don't have to think about his scared face, here's a picture of Bo today - healthy and perfect. Please everyone with doggies, keep an emergency pack of Benadryl somewhere handy. I am not sure Bo would have survived without it.

This was a picture I took the morning before this experience.



And this was the night after the episode - do you think I slept a wink? Never. I was too worried and had to watch him to make sure there was no relapse.


We read online that you can give dogs, when an emergency like this happens, up to 1 mg of Benadryl per pound of dog...Bo is an 80 pound dog and that night we gave him only one pill - 25 mg...we are accepting the fact that he was okay and that tiny Benadryl helped as a miracle.


2 comments:

  1. I would have freaked out too. My dog is one of my kids.
    I am happy Bo made it through. I can't even image how hard that night was!

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