Tuesday, May 31, 2011

More Doggie and Construction News

Sunday was a real scorcher in more ways than one. It seems to me (and probably scores of others) that this year’s heat wave is hotter and lasting longer than last year’s. And it’s not because I’m living in my RV. I did last year. Plain and simple, it’s hotter. A few hours ago, it was 95 degrees. Now we’re down to 85 and it’s 7:20. A quick reminder to myself—I’m in Mexico!

Now for the way more than one. For the past two weeks Mindi has been in heat. Yep. Despite being spayed a year ago, this is her second heat. Her character has changed completely. Sunday, Humberto was here helping me with carpentry jobs. I never thought that a female dog in heat would detect testosterone… duh… she did. And before I’d realized what was happening, she was attacking her sibling Tina (probably in an effort to claim the poor lone testosterone bearer for herself). Then Tasha and Queenie got into the foray and it was a rather scary outbreak of canine revolt, all ganging up on Mindi. She gave as good as she got. The hose put an end to it, but not before Mindi had suffered a couple of bites; from whom? I have no idea.

I hardly slept that night. My vet had given me calming tabs made of natural ingredients that were quite effective. For the dogs, not me. But I had to double the dose for Mindi. And she had to be separated from the others. At 5 in the morning sleep eluded me completely. I felt so bad and sorry for my poor dog who probably had no idea what was happening to her… and I had no idea where to turn for help.

Here, I’m not sure if it’s governed by the state, there is a PERRERA. This is a woman who will collect dogs who live on the street or elsewhere and present a menace to the population, human or other. They are usually euthanized. I was given her number by MY veterinarian. She also gave me the number for Proteccion Civil, a body of officers who take care of problems other than criminal ones. However, they must have been busy with the Wine and Cheese Fair, held here annually for one week, ending next weekend. I never got an answer. As far as MY vet was concerned, she claimed to be out of town.

I frankly did not know where to turn. So I prayed to be inspired. As I went to bed and again as I woke up at 5 A.M. In calm, quiet expectation, I waited for some kind of an answer and got the impression that I should wait until 7 A.M. and call Control Canino. I hadn’t thought of that one. It’s a public veterinarian service in San Juan del Rio that had spayed both Mindi and Tina a year before. I did. I immediately got an answer from the lady in the office, who incidentally remembered me and my dogs. I explained the situation and asked for advice. She said that I should bring Mindi that very day, and that the veterinarian would perform adequate surgery for free, since it had been the same vet who’d spayed both of them.

Can I express how incredibly grateful I was for this piece of news? I’ll leave it to your imagination. The female vet in town had said that she’d need ultrasound (quite pricey) to localize what pedazo, or fragment of an ovary, had wandered off somewhere. We were talking here of $$$$. I had to find transportation and called Jimena who said that a friend, Yvonne, would gladly take me there. Here’s another benevolent angel who helped in my time of need. I must have been kind to a lot of people in a past life. A lot of people are superbly kind to me in his one!

Later on Monday, (yesterday? but it feels as if it had been l o n g days before)  I took her to San Juan and she was operated later that day, or very early today (Tuesday) and I could pick her up around 2 P.M.  I did. The vet wanted to explain what had occurred. He said that she had suffered from quite a rare ectopic syndrome, in which a small non-malignant tumour forming on an ovary will travel and seek refuge and attach itself elsewhere post-spaying. It  had happened here, on a kidney. Later fed by the blood stream, that fragment took on the characteristics of an ovary and produced estrogen, precipitating a rut season. He then showed me the culprit, remarking that it was a good thing that I’d had her checked for surgery while in heat, a suggestion denied earlier by MY vet. It made for swelling of the “false organ”, which in turn made it easy to find, without ultrasound. I was shown it.

Now here’s the good part. Spaying or neutering at Control Canino costs about 25 dollars per dog. That’s what I had paid. But because this complication came up after the surgery, all that I had to pay was the cost of the anesthesia, which came up to 100 pesos, or about 8 dollars! And to top it all, the vet took the time to explain all to me, unhurriedly and gently.

Mindi is now home but separate from the other dogs. Tina growled at her upon arrival, this despite the fact that she’d been forlorn without her sibling, and Mindi replied the same way. All of it within the first 30 seconds. But the estrogen now in her body should slowly dissipate within a week to 10 days. The vet could have given her an injection of progesterone to neutralize the estrogen, but it would have fostered signs of a false pregnancy and brought on more complications. So, all’s well that ends well. At least for the next 10 days. Macho dogs were soon at the gate… unwelcome suitors.

Now that I’ve elaborated on Mindi’s canine crisis, I have no more time or energy to talk about the construction. So, see you all tomorrow with good news about the construction! I’m off now to have a good night’s sleep.

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