bella club
Originally uploaded by studio583art.
The true Bellaceraptor!
First, we just want to thank everyone for your kind words, prayers and well wishes for our special little girl. It really means so much to all three of us, as you know that Bella is the center that makes Team Bella go!
Well, we are back, sorry it's been so long since our last post, it's been somewhat crazy to say the least. Soooooo....The quick & dirty of it is YES, Bella is doing great. She went in last Thursday morning to have her bad toe removed and she couldn't have done better. Her surgeon, Dr. Corse (the newest SuperFriend member to join Team Bella), just could not say enough great things about her (like normal, the purple nose bandit charms everyone). Some of the best news that we got even before B. went in was that all her pre-surgery blood work came back and looked amazing! In fact, our new favorite doc said that she has the blood levels of a 7-9 year old and that she has an incredible quality of life. Hee-hee, I guess two silly, off-beat artist aren't too bad at this weime love thing after all. That everything in a simple Bellashell but if you want more details please read on (though this may get long, you know how silly Bella parents are).
But I'm jumping ahead a little...told you it's been crazy so bear with me if I jump around to much. We first went in on Wednesday to meet Dr. Corse and discuss everything that is B. - her history (trust me, no joke, her med. file is the size of 'War & Peace' and can make lesser docs whimper), her health, age (never an issue for us), nature and finally her toe. It was also for us to just get a feel for Dr. Corse even though he came highly recommend by others that we have a great deal of trust in, but hey, there's nothing like your own impression and instinct...plus, we don't let just anyone near our little girl. Well, let's just say, if you are in Atlanta, hell if you are in the Southeast and your pup-pup needs a board certified (more on this later) surgeon (and hopefully your little wonderpup will never, ever, ever need one), then Dr. Corse is your man. Not only is he simply an incredible surgeon, but he has one of those wonderful 'makes the world a better place simply because he's in it' kind of personalities. He is so...well, good and personable, that his nature and smile just makes you smile. It's so rare to met someone so intelligent (he has more letters behind his name than most people have in their name) who has such a warm personality. I have to say that we both walked away thinking...wow, we are so evil, you know, artist...evil, well we will kill bugs and besides, we have an OOna Kitties, how good could we really be.
Anyway, so we all four sat on the floor and talked...well, mainly we both talked over each other while Dr. Corse took notes and giggled (you see, when it comes to little Miss. B., we both just get so excited that we tend to talk over each other or tell the same stories back to back and it can be rather silly especially when Bella decides to throw in her two cents worth). So we went over everything, her whole medical history, throwing in a few of her silly adventures to boot. The crazy thing is not only had he read her complete file, but HE HAD READ HER COMPLETE FILE. This is nuts, have you seen her file? Besides the fact that it's so bigs (ok, mainly that's it) but also because most normal mortals wouldn't even be able to understand it (crazy).
So anyway, these are just some of what we learned. First, from just looking at Bella and the history of her weak hind legs (and no one else has been able to diagnose the what, why and how) he was able to give us a intelligent guess as to what it was - FCE or Fibrocartilaginous Embolism (http://www.marvistavet.com/html/body_fibrocartilaginous_embolism.html) and any dog can suffer from it, but it is hard it diagnose and even harder to treat. This was the first time we have gotten any kind of answer as to why and what as far as her hind legs go. Sometimes you just want to know that it wasn't something you could have prevented (I'll try to give a short synopses on FCE on another post so everyone can be aware of it). So then, as Dr. Corse examines B. from head to toe, he says that she has an incredible quality of life (beaming with pride here!) and that not only do we do a great job of caring for her needs and diet but that the only arthritis that she has is in the bad toe that needs to be removed (go figure, guess Team Bella does get it right here & there). The other thing that Dr. Corse told us did get both our blood boiling, not at Dr. Corse but rather at a previous vet and vet office that we use to take Bella to. As I have mention before in previous post, Bella has beaten cancer 3 times in her life...or so we though. Yes, that's right folks, it seems that one of her previous vets and vet offices lied to us about one of her cyst. At the time they (the doctor and vet office) basically told us that she had a form of cancer and that it had to be removed. This was back in 2005 before we had started posting and we were pretty much told that there was a good chance that we were going to lose her, we both were walking around like the living dead. We have since stop going to that vet office for other reasons but it's just ridiculous that you trust of the one of the most important things in your life to someone one and place that you think is telling you straight then only to find out later that they lied but put your love one in danger. What we found out (basically because Dr. Corse needed to look at all her records, especially that particular cancer spot since it was on the same foot as her current bad toe) is that after Dr. Corse looked it over he showed us that before it had been simply a Synovial Cyst (benign mass) & Fibroplasia (formation of fibrous tissue) not cancer and had been removed without need. You just don't know...
This is me muttering an obscenity under my breath....
It really make you angry that a ligament vet office would do that and on top of everything else it turns out that the vet that was doing there surgery was now a board-certified surgeon. We just did not know to look for that then, but you can bet we do now. A word to the wise, before you let any vet, no matter how great the vet office is, work on you pet check out the vet, the practice and their surgeon. All this can be found on the web now. You are always you pets best defense, we were lucky. And we were lucky to have found such a incredible surgeon this time around.
So, back to the current bad toe. We did know it was cancer, being wiser and check behind everyone (we got four opinions in a very short time period, we weren't messing around) and Dr. Corse after the meet & greet said she was perfect for the surgery even at her age. We took her in the next morning, that Thursday, and Dr. Corse called us before she went in, after she came out and when she woke up...each time with better and better updates on her progress. She went through the surgery like a 5 year old. The evil toe was gone... YAY!
So Friday morning we go to pick her up you can imagine our surprise when I see my girl has a fat bloody nose! It seems that the little weime rat had been ramming her nose and paws through the kennel fence all night during recovery! We forgot to tell them how much she despises the chain link fence of a wire crate. Besides that, she look great considering she had just gone through major surgery. Her foot completely splinted and wrapped up. Oh, a note for anyone with a pup that likes to rip off bandages, put underarm deodorant on the bandage, it will taste bad, dry out there tongue and they should leave it alone.
So, a really long story short B. is home, happy and resting. She's eating and has some hacking from the inervating tube but otherwise is managing to walk with the splint
that will be on her leg for 2 weeks. Did I say that Dr. Corse said that
she has an "excellent" quality of life. Hey...beaming here...
Love from Bellaland!
