Somethin’s gotta go…

And I think it’s about to be this puppy…

Today or tomorrow, the biopsy report is supposed to come in. If it’s cancer, the first thing that’s gonna happen is Ruby is going straight back to the breeder. I certainly can’t care for her if I’ve got half my boob lopped off and am looking at weeks of irradiation and subsequent radiation sickness.

Even if it’s benign, I may have to return her. Mortal illness or no, we’re rapidly reaching the point here where I can’t take care of her.

She barfed all over the bed again last night. So at midnight I had to pull ALL the bedding off and remake the bed. This was after she’d had me up about once an hour from 10:00 forward.

Of course she went back in her crate at that point. Briefly. For the rest of the night, she was up about once every hour. I finally had to put her back on the bed to get her to settle down long enough to get 90 minutes’ or an hour’s worth of  uninterrupted rest.

I think her UTI is probably back, since I can’t find any new dog mounds in the yard, which means she’s not wanting to run out to squirt brown puddles on the ground. And what causes the barfing, I can’t imagine. This was SIX HOURS after she’d been fed. Normally, a dog’s food moves through its stomach quite fast. The entire digestive process takes six to eight hours. So she shouldn’t be woofing up virtually undigested food after six hours. Since the food does seem to be undigested, she actually may be regurgitating rather than vomiting, but if that’s the case, it’s mighty weird that the food would sit there without moving for all of six hours. In either case, it sounds like an expensive fix. Or a lifelong nightmare struggle.

{sigh} So. To add hassle on top of headache on top of worry, I’ll have to call the vet this morning and make an appointment so as to get in the door if I don’t have cancer (50-50 chance, we’re told), and then explain that if the biopsy results are positive, we’ll have to cancel because the puppy is going back where she came from. First thing, though — like right this minute — I’ve got to wash the sheets, blanket, and doggy throw.

In any event, the pup’s health issues are starting to drive  me crazy. I can’t deal with all this sh!t at once. Last night I didn’t read the stoont papers that came in — figure to read those while the students are in class today, since they’ll be in the computer commons putatively working on their 2500-word final papers (read “playing computer games, checking in at Twitter & FB, and surfing the Web”).

Even if the stress of the cancer scare goes away, come next Tuesday I’ll still have 62,500 words of drivel to read in a matter of maybe three days. Fortunately my associate will be back in town pretty quick, but since one invariably becomes sick after riding on airplanes and since she’ll be coming in from halfway around the world, it remains to be seen whether she’ll be in any shape to help out.