Merry Christmas Dakota

Dakota loves being with her people. So much so, that if we are doing stuff out in the yard and make her stay inside she barks and jumps at the windows trying to get out with you. She really just doesn't want to miss any fun. This was true yesterday when we were putting up the Christmas lights. Since it was such a beautiful day, we brought her outside with us and tied her to one of the trees. She spent the morning barking at every cat and squirrel that was anywhere on the street, and chewing on some branches that had dropped into the yard (one of her favorite activities). It seemed like a great day for her. But when we were done with the lights and I brought her inside, I noticed that she kept rubbing one of her eyes with her paw and that it was watering. I figured she had gotten something in it, so I --hoping to get what ever was bothering her out. We then left for the ward party.

When we returned home, eye was all swollen. I gave her some Benadryl hoping it was allergies. But when I got up early the next morning, her eye looked really bad. It was red and swollen, and really had me worried. So I got online to research what to do about eye problems in animals. Everything I read said that if an animal injures their eye you need to get them into a vet within 12 hrs or they could lose their sight. This was not good. Since it was Sunday, our vet was closed. I really didn't want to spend the money to take her to the emergency vet clinic, but I also didn't want her to lose an eye because I was cheap. So I put Dakota in the car and took her to the Emergency Animal Clinic on 249. There they put some dye in her eye and then examined it with a special light. It turns out that she had scratched her cornea. So they gave us eye drops, antibiotic, a pain killer and put a big cone around her neck so she can't rub her eye and make it worse. Poor baby. So I paid the bill--$228, ouch!--and took her home.

Dakota did not like the cone, and she looked pretty pitiful in it. It took her a while to adjust walking around in it and she would run into everything. I was sure she was gong to break something in the house or injure herself--as she would often catch it while she was running. This was actually pretty amusing--especially when she was outside. Dakota has a path in the backyard that she likes to run around. This path goes between two of our trees. So the first time I let her outside with her cone on, she ran her path and hit the cone on the trees as she went through. It was so funny. I had to take the cone off and get out all the pieces of bark. And it took her a couple of day before she adjusted to her extra width. At least we get some laughter along with the big vet bill. Some times you have to grab onto any silver lining you can find!

I didn't get a picture of Dakota in her collar, and it didn't come back from the Vet's when we kenneled her over Christmas. But this is pretty much what she looked like: