The girls came home from school on Tuesday this week to find Rust paralysed from the waist down. When we came to NZ we got 2 black labs, puppies from the same litter. We called them Ben and Inca. The names came from the wonderful BBC programme called Castaway. I guess it was a reality show, before reality shows became popular. One of the 'Castaway's' was a very well bred young man called Ben (I think he was an art editor with Tatler or some such magazine. Anyway, Ben was a likeable guy with a black lab called Inca. We liked the name Inca and Ben just followed.
The puppies grew up. Eric got a job as the local animal control officer to help out financially while he studied. We resolved that we would not take in waif and stray dogs (we do that enough with people:-)), unless it was a chocolate lab. Ben was always a bit stroppy and, after going for Eric and I on separate occassions we had him put down. Eric shot him as he tucked into a few of his favourite biscuits. Lots of people asked how he could do that but, think about it. It was actually far more human than loading him into the car and taking him into a vet where he would then have a needle stuck in him in unfamiliar surroundings. As it was Inca was not left alone as a few months earlier we had acquired Rust, a chocolate lab that was about the same age as our labs but probably going to be put down.
Rust has been paralysed for 4 days now and apart from wagging his tail is not showing any signs of progress. On the previous Monday night, well in the early hours of Tuesday morning, Eric was woken up by Rust barking madly. He looked out to see Rust trying to dig out under the fencing of their pound and even using his teeth and lifting the hugely heaving chain link structure. Eric went out and found he was going mad at a hedgehog walking just outside the pound!! Anyway, Eric moved the hedgehog, growled at Rust and went back to bed. In the morning all was normal and Rust ran out for his breakfast and charged around as usual. I went off early in the morning as I was teaching in Hamilton. The boys were locked up again when Eric, Harriette and Alice went off together to school/work. In hindsight, Alice remembered that Rust was lying down as they drove off, he would normally have been standing up wagging his tail. So, the girls came home and found him paralysed. Eric was with clients so could not be contacted so they rang me. They are lucky I happen to answer the phone as it was on silent. I had just finished teaching my last session. I came home, loaded Rust up and took we him to the vets where we left him for a night and 2 days. Big discussions about possible diagnosis, how far to go with diagnostics and treatment and of course, prognosis. Our attitude is that we need to know he has an 80% chance of recovery in a short-ish period and that recovery means he can run around. Anything less than that is not acceptable. We heard of a jack russell locally that had a year of physio and can just about walk. Things are not looking good. X-Rays do not show anything. We have decided that if after 1 week he cannot support his weight we will have him put down. So now he is at home. He is out on the deck during the day (where he would have spent the day anyway), allowed in the kitchen for the evening (the labs are not allowed indoors normally) and sleeps in the laundry at night. We are not very hopeful as he has showed no signs of improvement so far.
