Two weeks ago, Bennet stopped me near the end of the day to tell me Blue and Russ were bringing Dougie in with a hurt foot.
I grabbed my phone off the top of the fridge to see I had several missed phone calls and messages from Blue and Russ. But the team already had it handled. Doug was in good hands and on his way in.
Dr. Petersen said he would help with the last few patients. I asked him if it was ok if I stayed late to take care of Doug. “Of course!” he said.
The ENTIRE team rallied to prepare for Dougie’s arrival and set up for surgery.
I learned later that Dougie had hurt himself on a fence post we thought had been removed years ago. It had apparently broken underground and surfaced since. Dougie runs the fence with his Pittie friends next door, and hurt his main pad on that sharp post.
Blue was letting him in from playing outside and noticed a LOT of blood. Way calmer than I would have, they expertly wrapped his paw in bandage material and got him set for his first visit to Westgate Animal Clinic.
Jeanne and I were seeing appointments together. I asked if we could just peek in at Doug to see how bad his wound was and if he needed triaged. “Of course!” she said.
I love this strange new land and its people so much.
It WAS bad, and he DID need immediate intervention. I did not get that information from Doug, but from his wound itself. Doug was too busy with his epic meet and greet to even remember he was hurt.
We rebandaged and sedated him. His tail, of course, was the last part of him to be sedated (and the first to wake up!)
Once our work day was done and we got to surgery, I could just see the main pad in the square cut out of the sterile drape, and not my entire beautiful injured dog, so the case got way more fun. I love suturing, and to protect you, I will only say it looked great when we were done.
Doug made it his mission to further develop my empathy for clients I tell to keep a bandage clean and dry…or a patient rested…or a cone on. Holy mackerel that is a full time all family project!
You may want to get Doug’s side of the story. As exciting as all this was, his version has WAY more fun, WAY more emphasis on the new friends he met and WAY more exclamation marks. It may not even include a paw pad laceration.
Thank you Blue. Thank you Russell. Thank you awesome team. You did great, and I am so grateful to you and for you.
