Kesey’s Back…mostly…

His smile is back.

As I’ve mentioned, Kesey had never turned down food in his life, so his refusal to eat throughout the past two weeks had us very concerned.  We took him off his antibiotic and he is nearly back to normal…he’s even eating kibble!  He does still leave a few bits of food in his bowl, so that’s strange, but he’s eating at least as much as he was pre-amputation.  We’ve been feeding him a mix of different grain free canned foods, Evo kibble, dehydrated raw, and homemade foods including chicken breast, cottage cheese and eggs.

Friday, my mom and I stopped to check out the grain free options at the Clipper Cottage (my parent’s Cocker, Zoe, has her hair styled there).  They had a wide variety of options, including some I had not seen elsewhere, Orijen and Taste of the Wild.  They also had some canned tripe, which I’d read no dog would refuse, so I picked up a can of that.  Now that I’ve read more about what it is, I’m totally disguted by it and am not sure I’d buy it again.  Also on the shelves, were dog treats made from Tripe.  I brought a few samples home and Kesey devoured them.  He did not eat the other sample treats I brought for him.  Clipper Cottage was awesome b/c they had so many free samples…we will be trying lots of new foods in the coming days.

L is building new stairs on our deck as well as doing some general improvements b/c the entire deck is quite unsightly.  Our backyard is inaccessible from our house without use of the deck, which is elevated about 5 feet off the ground.  The current stairs are kind of rickety (and terribly ugly) anyway, so this was a project that’s been needing done.  L’s making the stairs much wider and longer, closing them in, and in general just trying to create a way for Kesey to reach the backyard.  If Kesey can’t use the new and improved stairs, we’ll continue taking him out front, but it would be nice to avoid that and it would be nice for Kesey to feel a little more “normal” too.  Today my dad and L worked on the stairs most of the day.  The new ones should be ready to go tomorrow.

Kesey hung out in the backyard with us all day today.  He seemed very happy to spend time under his favorite tree.  Later this afternoon, Kesey and I went for a short walk – about 10 minutes round trip.  Kesey definitely had a little spring in his step, but he tires quickly.

Here’s another shot of his incision site…looking good, isn’t it?  I expect the remaining staples will come our when we see Dr. Sporer Tuesday.