The Day and Night of Surgery
I dropped Beau off at the vet’s at 7:30 am and went on to work, warning all my co-workers to expect a basket case in the office that day. By 8:30, I had a call from the vet’s office. I started panicking, but it turned out that they just had a question about when he’d received his last dose of Metacam. The technician told me he was fine – so fine that he wouldn’t go to sleep with the pre-anesthesia like a good boy should! We decided he was looking for cheese – that’s what he usually gets when he goes to the vet.
The morning passed slowly, but by 12:30 I had a call that the surgery had gone well, Beau was in recovery, just waking up, and we arranged to pick him up at 4:30 that day. Leaving him overnight was an option, but because the office was not staffed at night, we felt that it was best to just take him home. The vet agreed and encouraged us to do so.
Upon arriving at the vet’s office, we had some much welcomed good news! The meniscus had not been damaged. And the CCL had only partially torn. He had still needed the surgery to repair the tear, but this could only be good news for his recovery and long term prognosis. Our wallet fared slightly better than the estimates as well. The total cost of the surgery and take home medicines was approximately $1,500. (This does not include the initial x-rays and exam.) Of course, seeing Beau again was the best part! He hobbled and he was a bit groggy, but he was glad to see us! He’d been shaved more than I had anticipated and he wore a purple polka dot bandage, but he was managing to “walk” which I hadn’t expected. His “walk” has his bad leg either slightly lifted or with an awkward (and rather eerie) toe dragging gait. We lifted him into the car and took him home. Once home, I did have the foresight to make sure he stopped on the grass to relieve himself so that he wouldn’t need to go outside again for awhile.
The evening was fairly uneventful. Beau had trouble getting in the lying down position, but he managed after a time – perhaps as much as 15 minutes. We gave him a little food, administered his pain medication on schedule and tried to ensure that he was as comfortable as possible. One odd thing was that he didn’t really sleep, his eyes were open and just staring ahead. But since he otherwise seemed okay, we let him be. He became restless around 2:00 am, and we took him outside, re-dosed him and tried to settle him down. Once again, he had some trouble figuring out how to lie down and he was also disappointed that the couch access had been blocked, but eventually he opted for his own bed that we had brought down from upstairs. I believe he actually slept much better than we did that night.