Another Pet Disaster

[sheepdog 10]

Yesterday morning I let our 2 dogs out in the morning, I sent them out the front door because that is the door they normally go out, but hubby had asked me to sweep the snow off his 4 wheeler so the seat would have time to dry by the time he got home with a load of dog food, so he could use it to take the feed around, since we still have a lot of ice and snow on the ground here. It was parked out behind the house. It was pretty covered up and it took me maybe 5 minutes to get it cleaned off. I then went back threw the house and out into the garage to get my 4 wheeler. I keep mine parked inside because the seat is bad, no outer cover, just a piece of foam that acts like a big sponge if it gets rained on. As I backed out and got in front of the house I saw our little Mini Schnauzer sitting on the front porch chewing on something green looking. I knew instantly what it was, a chunk of rat poison. I immediately ran to her and kicked it away from her and grabbed her and checked her mouth to see if there were any crumbs in her mouth I could wipe out, but didn't see any. There were crumbs all around the chunk so I knew she had been chewing on it. I went back in and called my regular vet and he wasn't home so I called a local vet. All they could tell me to do way to give her hydrogen peroxide to make her vomit it up. So I tried that. Tried 4 times, would do it every 10-15 minutes and she never did throw up. I called the local vet again and all they said I could do was give her a bigger dose, so I tried one more time and she still wouldn't barf it up. The vet's office told me they had never heard of a dog not vomiting after getting peroxide. I asked them several times if there was anything else I could do and they kept telling me there was nothing to be done. I even mentioned using vitamin K and they claimed they'd never heard of that. By then I was able to get in touch with my regular vet, but he didn't have much more to tell me to do, and by then the poison had been in her for several hours and I really didn't think making her vomit was going to be any help at that time. I did however, find a full box of poison in the car, and in reading the ingredient label and all the warnings, I found the recommendation to give vitamin k. So I ended up taking the box in to the local vets and showing it to them. They still acted like they didn't have a clue, but the did have a bottle of vitamin K on hand so I bought that, and they told me to give her 1 and 1/2 pill every day for a month. So I get home and find out they are not pills, but liquid filled gel caps. So how in the hell do you cut a gel cap in half? I had to call the vet again as soon as I got home and wait till they told me it was ok to just give one pill per day. By then I was getting pretty annoyed, like wasn't it enough I was worried about our dog without all the extra BS going on? Times like that almost makes me wish I had found some way to go to vet school, I told them about the vitamin K long before I got the package and looked on it for the antidote.

 

Anyway, I got her started on the vitamin K. She seems fine today, not acting sick in any way, but the rat poison is a blood thinner and there is always the chance of her having internal bleeding and not really showing any symptoms until it's too late anyway. I worry about bruising her every time I pick her up or our other dog gets to playing around with her. She also hurt her leg a few weeks ago and is still limping from that, that's why I have to pick her up, she isn't able yet to jump up on the couch with me because of her hurt back leg. I guess all I can do is keep giving her the pills and hope for the best.