There is so much to update since the urgency to save BHRR’s Barkley’s life with his emergency surgery last Thursday April 1st. Our goals are kept small and focused. To get him through the first 12 hours and then the next 12 hours and then the next 24 and then the next 24 hours. The first 5 days are going to be the most critical for BHRR’s Barkley. Please consider donating to ‘BEGGING FOR BARKLEY’S Fundraiser! We cannot continue to do what we do best without our amazing public fans of BHRR and the animals in need of BHRR! Truly, $5.00 is not too small! I am truly begging for whatever assistance we can obtain to help Barkley. He is a walking ‘miracle’!!!!

Night 1 & Day 1– April 1st & April 2nd:
Though Chelsea, Stephanie, myself and Tama carried Barkley into my car; he walked in to the house – he was standing up in my back seat on the way home – and he promptly peed in our ‘triage’ area instead of outside! LOL I had to manually ‘pill’ him with his Tramadol plus Clavamox as he was not yet allowed to begin to eat anything and I did not go home with hydro to inject which I normally have done in the past. The idea was to go home with two extra bags of fluid, yet we only had one left at KAH plus the one he was still on and so, if needed I would head out to OVH or Alta Vista to obtain a bag off them if needed.

I have never had an obstruction animal walk into our home post-surgery. Barkley is just incredible with how he is travelling this road to recovery.

Flushed his line on his IV, checked his surgical area, took some pictures(will also post pictures taken at KAH durning his procedure) and he settled for a few hours, took him out for a huge pee before going to bed around 1 AM.

Up just before 4 AM for he was uncomfortable, got him re-settled with Sean in the triage area and then up at 6 AM, took him out, no pee this time and no more leaking of diarrhoea since I got him home last night and changed his bag of fluids/flushed his line, offered him some gastro canned food with his Clavamox; ate wonderfully and then he went and settled down again for a couple of hours. He has really bonded with Sean as Sean was the one who spent the night in the triage area with him as I took the other dogs with me into our bedroom. My dogs have seen enough surgical cases here that they know the routine and are very respectful.

Had another huge pee around 10:30 AM and shotly afterwards I offered him more food with his Tramadol and that went well, so I pulled him off his fluid bag on April 2nd around 2:45 PM. The bag would have finished around 4 PM as is and we did not have the second extra bags to put him on to ideally keep him on the fluids for 24 hours post-op YET it if he was eating and drinking then he could be taken off the fluids. He has had two more huge pees.

Night 2 – April 2nd:
BHRR’s Barkley had a much better night. He is eating his gastro like he has been starving, which of course he had been(barely over 81 pounds when he was surrendered) yet he is not yet ready to be re-introduced to kibble.

Day 2 – April 3rd:
Barkley continues to eat really well, pee and my only one very small concern was his lack of drinking(several reasons can be found for this) and we tried wetting down the Gastro with water etc. AS of this AM, his pee was beginning to become a wee bit more concentrated. He did have a really good night of rest with Sean in the triage area too! He is taking his meds well(and I am happy that I do not have to manually pill him anymore too! LOL). GOSH! He is so bonded to Sean! HOLY! 🙂 BHRR’s Barkley is such an affectionate boy!!!!

Anyway, I did bring home from work that day a bag of Sodium Chloride in case I needed to subq him(with the temps outside, that does not help right now) yet finally later today, he had about 3 cups of water between noon and tonight for Sean while I was working at the Hospital and then training a Client SOOOOO we are still on track with moving forward! I shall recheck his surgical area again tonight.

As mentioned there are several reasons why he was most likely not drinking and just in case I have what I need on hand if I have to subq him as I like to be prepared.

From talking to another one of the Vets that I work with and with him having looked at Barkley’s surgical pictures, he is indeed one incredibly lucky boy! Truly a miracle that he survived with an obstruction like this for so long and how close he was to having a perforation.  😥

Now, we wait for ‘poop’! It can take anywhere from 3-5 days post-op. AND this is essential to his survival and knowing if his surgery is really successful.

Night 3: April 3rd:
Tonight, we put BHRR’s Barkley into a collosal crate to rest and dismantled our ‘triage’ area. BHRR’s Barkley had become so tightly bonded to Sean that we could already see small signs of S/A beginning to develop and we also did not wish to encourage any possible ‘resourcing’ for apparently Barkley has resourced over things such as high value things like Rawhides in his old home. From what I was told he had even resourced over his own vomit at one time. With Sean quickly becoming a ‘high’ value item to Barkley, we wanted to ‘nix’ that in the bud before anything developed yet we have had no issues with resourcing here right now. He has ‘grumped’ at the dogs at time when they have passed his crate yet that is not unusual. His crate is in the high traffic area of our sunroom and once he is told ‘no’, he settles down fine. This is a whole new environment for Barkley and though he lived in a home with one other dog(PitX), there are a few more here than there! 😉 Dogs can feel threatened if they are closed in, even if a person or dog approaching their crate is friendly. This does not worry me. He is acting totally normal. Also, he has been fully integrated with all but a mere handful of dogs right now, not all at once and he has been fine. Curious, tail wagging and if anything interested in possibly seeing if he has made a new friend or two. He is wearing his E-Collar for he would for certain go right for his incision as he has done at his IV line. He is great about us taking it on and off and it has not fazed him in wearing it. The second day, he did spend some time trying to get it off yet is accepting of it. It is already doctored with duct tape from him cracking it on our coffee table the first night. He was also very unsure of our hardwood floors when he first came here after surgery. He is still quite hesitant even now.

Day 3 – April 4th – “WE HAVE POOP!”
Barkley had a large, soft yet nicely formed poop around 8:30 AM today. There was no straining and he was not in the least bit uncomfortable nor was there any blood or debris in it. This is HUGE HUGE HUGE! Even as per his Vet that I sent an update to: “That’s fantastic. Looks like he’s out of the woods now!”

Second poop around 4:00 PM and it soft, no mucous, blood and no signs of straining or being uncomfortable. A little more gas this time. He continues to eat his Gastro like he is starving and though he still is not drinking water out of a bowl on its own, he is at least staying hydrated. We are mashing up his wet food with water to encourage him to stay hydrated. Today was the first day that Sean took him into the fenced in yard(so many smells from the other dogs there, so we had been taking him outside the fenced in yard to our front lawn to do his ‘thing’) and he handled it really well.

Night 4 – April 4th:
We have leant that BHRR’s Barkley is not comfortable going out at night to pee. So many sounds in the country that he is not used to. He just quickly voids a bit and then wants to come in. As he is here longer, he will adjust well. If he continues to eat and drink well, then I shall introduce some kibble to his food Monday night(April 5th) – Day 4. You can tell that though he is still quite painful, he is feeling a lot better and gosh, he was so excited/happy to see me Monday AM, April 5th, that he literally wanted to jump on me. 🙂 The pain that he is going through now is a ‘healing’ pain and no longer the agonizing pain he had been experiencing.  I have also noticed that neither one of his ears are standing. I know in  the past from his previous visits to KAH(has been some time since I have seen him that is for sure) that one of his ears would stand yet that was almost a year ago, I guess. No matter, he is adorable and I see no reason why he cannot be placed up for adoption once he is full healed. He makes me miss my own Dobie that I lost in 1989! Such a fantastic breed of dog!