Change of plans

[Jade]

Judy update!

Judy has been with us almost exactly one week now. She has still been very very sweet, hasn't actually hurt Butters yet (relief!), and is adapting more and more. We did remove her collar (immediately after I posted actually) and she's mostly without, unless she goes outside. We did find out one thing about her... she has either an injury or a deformity, on her foot. When we first found her and were walking her around, it was obvious her back feet were tender, I thought she must have come a long ways, so we let her rest. Turns out, even a short walk will get her limping - upon examination of her back feet, her right foot is missing two nails, and part of one of the pads. It's hard to tell if it's an old injury or a deformity - though Kile says it feels like the two toes without nails are fused together.

So, she's not a sled dog, and she's not our future backpacking sherpa, but she's so beautiful and sweet. We keep upping the age we think she might be because 95% of the day she is so mellow. Unfortunately, though, she has had a couple of panic attacks - but taking her on walks to let out some of the nervous energy seems to keep them at a minimum. The problem, being, her little gimpy foot gets uncomfortable very fast. Kile said a dog missing a pad on the bottom of its foot is basically walking bone-on-ground, which WOULD hurt. We might look into getting a little booty for her, if that would provide any relief. She doesn't chew, lick, or gnaw on it - or seem particularly obsessed with it at all. She just sometimes carries it for relief during a walk.

The interesting synch regarding that is that about 2 weeks ago, Butters started presenting an injured foot on his hind LEFT leg. The other day by the end of our walk, one was carrying one foot and the other was carrying the other. Oy vey. Butters is mostly healed with his, though. Hers I think will always need special help.

The only thing I'm even worried a bit about is how aggressively grabby she can be with toys (and treats, but I think I figured out the trick to that one), she'll grab a toy so violently right next to Butters, especially if Butters comes close. They really want to play together (and have a little bit, and have snuggled some too), but it's still a bit scary the way she likes to "play". The other thing is I feel bad about her panic attacks. They usually start in the evening, which has made me consider more possible theories for who she is and how she came to be (she's SO mellow all day, and then gets really wound up and spazzy and pacing in the evening, which makes me think she may have just spent most of her days in a kennel all day. Which would be why, during the day, being outside of the kennel makes her so content. But then it's definitely like she's expecting someone to get home in the evenings, like her "release" is timed for that moment.) We took her on two walks yesterday, though, and she had no panic last night at all - just mellow and cucumber cool.

Now it's probably time to start detaching myself a bit from the Colorado Springs lost pet circuit, because it is a bit encompassing, trying to match lost and found pictures across the different websites. It's a good/fun service but there are many people doing it, and also it can be quite sad at times. Keep your pets locked up, friends! And a microchip costs like $30 if there's any chance you might lose it, it's worth it. Just remember to register it.... so many found dogs with chips that weren't registered... very sad. And if you find a dog or cat, almost all vets/shelters (I went to the vet at Petsmart) will scan them for free. The microchip is a little grain of rice with a serial number on it - the owner then has to manually register the number with their info in a database. I think maybe some people just don't understand exactly what microchips are capable of - not much, they are just a permanent name tag basically.