Bread, Anal Glands, Parties & Car Crashes

I'm sure I'm up for some kind of blog award with that title. The sad thing is I can connect them all :( It was a crazy week over here. Ryan had his speech evaluation but I'll get to that in a few days. I am still processing the whole situation. Onto bread.

My dogs (hmm...i think i've mentioned them before!) ate an entire loaf of Trader Joe's potatoe rosemary bread. #1 its bad for them...#2. thats my favorite bread, and the only white bread i eat so its a treat...and we were supposed to be having it that night with spaghetti and meatballs. Major bummer. Then the vomiting started. Shelby (the one who eats plastic and wood) seems to have an iron stomach and was not effected, though she skipped dinner which is unlike her. Nikki on the other hand, vomit factory. Large quantities of bread puke (sorry Liz). I should also mention that Ethan had just cleaned the carpets a few days prior. Yep. Fun stuff. I told Ethan to call his sister (our own personal vet tech) to see if we should be worried. He flaked, and I went on the internet to get some info. Its like when you are looking on Web MD and they say a sore throat can be allergies...or cancer. I read about dog bloat, which is their stomach getting all turned around and squeezed (apparently it isn't attached to something) and then they die. Other than the barfing she didn't have the other symptoms but I was terrified. Ethan finally called his sister after I told him we could possibly be just watching her die right in front of us. His sister was very concerned and had us feel her stomach and listen for sounds. Sounds are good. After a few more pukes we called two ER vets. One was worried about dough poisoning (not an issue since this was cooked bread--morons and the other said to bring her if we're worried. So helpful. What I wanted was someone to tell me IF ITS BLOAT SHE WOULD HAVE DIED ALREADY. By this point it had been 6-8 hrs after eating the bread. Ethan reasoned that if we drove her to the ER (30 min away) they would just watch her, just like we are...so I slept on the couch and Ethan went to bed. Nikki had her last barf at 12:15pm, ironically it was right onto the directions to the ER in case we needed them in the middle of the night. I got no sleep and was a nervous wreck. At some point she came and laid next to me and I knew she was ok. The next day both dogs ate and pooped so we were good...but ofcourse I texted my sister in law to make sure they were in the clear.

To add to this, I've had a weird sore throat on one side of my throat for a week. It just went away on Sunday. But I was dealing with that all week, and was hoarse and/or lost my voice a few of those days. I'm pretty sure its allergies...post nasal drip kind of stuff and I felt fine. Just one more thing.

2 days after the bread incident, Nikki was obsessively licking her butt. I finally got irritated enough that I checked to make sure all was ok down there (I'm such a mom) and lo and behold, there was a second butt. Apparently her anal glad ruptured. What? Yes, dogs have anal glands. I can give you a whole lot of info about them, but trust me, you don't want to know. I called my sister in law again (we are single handedly keeping that vet in business). I believe the conversation went like this:

Brandi: Hi, its me again
Sarah: What's wrong with Nikki?
Brandi: I feel stupid saying this, but I think Nikki has two butt holes.
Sarah: Uh oh, sounds like her anal gland ruptured.
Brandi: Um, gross....gag....
Sarah: Can you bring her in? We need to stitch that up and make sure it doesn't get infected. Then we'll "express" the other gland.

Super fun stuff. I had Ryan in the car within 20 min. We also had to take Shelby because I didn't have time to Shelby proof the house and it would have been plastic toy heaven for her. Oh, and this was about one hour from nap time. And its 30 min away. Did I mention we hadn't had lunch yet? Or showered? Awesome. We left Nikki with Sarah, and she had to have special anesthesia because of her liver issues, and cuz she is old. Then I took Ryan to McDonalds and hoped fries and nuggets would keep him awake on the car ride home. I called Ethan to give him the scoop--he had got my message but just couldn't deal with it. Like I could? Well, I managed to keep Ryan awake and got him down for a nap around 1:30. Not bad if I do say so myself. Sarah brought Nikki home that night with a sewed up butt and meds. I am happy to say she is fine. Though two nights ago I noticed a swollen pink bump on her lip...I'm not joking. Sarah thinks she might have been stung by something. Geez.

Onto Ryan's birthday party. We had about 30 people over Sunday, which means all week and Saturday were cleaning days, and ofcourse we had to carpet clean again due to the vomit. But, it was a nice time. We got a Spider Man jumpy house and the kids loved it. The cool thing was that there were only about 6 kids so it wasn't overwhelming. I decided to do appetizers from 2:30-6, like a drop in thing. I thought it would be less work. WRONG. It was way more work keeping up with the dips, quiches, brushetta, fruit, etc. I think I had too many varieties and grilling burgers would have been easier (especially since Ethan does the grilling). But oh well, my mom and sister helped a lot and now I know.

Car. At some point in the party Ethan's friend asked for a ride in the convertible. He ofcourse would never turn down the chance to show off his baby. After everyone was gone, he tells me something happened with the car. I immediately thought he hit my car as he backed out of the driveway. Turns out he accelerated into a corner, lost control and ended up on a median in our development, taking out a poor, defenseless tree. And the car looks yucky. Because it is so low to the ground it really took a beating. As he is telling me this I'm thinking, "we've only had this car since May and no way are we paying to get it fixed right now, we just had a huge huge vet bill." But, something came over me. Maybe because the party was over and the stress was gone--or maybe this is the real me. But I hugged him, told him I was sorry about his car, and said I was glad no one was hurt. I think Imight have shocked him. But it really is true. I thought back to when I parked his truck in our garage and the door closed on his back bumper. He knew I didn't mean to do it, but I could have been more careful. He didn't over react. Same thing here. He was probably showing off a little, but he didn't mean to hurt his car. He loves his car. And he was majorly embarassed that it happened with his friend in the car. And now he is obsessing about the insurance so I just let him be. Last night I reminded him how lucky we were that they weren't hurt, or anyone walking by, or a kid on a bike. And that we are lucky enough to have 3 cars, so this isn't an issue for him to get to work or anything like that. Accidents happen.

So, that has been my life the last week. Oh, throw Halloween in there too. I didn't exercise at all last week due to the sore throat. I need to get back in the swing of things. Oh, play group party here Wednesday. 20 kids. I'm insane.
I'll post birthday pics soon.