My dog is deaf

And I can think of a whole lot of opportunities I'd rather spend $732 on than dealing with the deaf dog's OCD.

Bella and Annie walked over to the vet today. Walking to the vet at 3:00 PM really isn't such a smart idea if you realize that schools let out between 2:30 and 3:00, AND there are two schools between you and the vet, with a third just past the vet. Two dogs sniffing around, thinking every single child you walk by smells of deelish? Yeah, frustrating walk.

At some point, however, Bella realized that we were ON A MISSION. She shifted into her on-a-mission pace, and Annie was the only dog I had to really deal with tugging and shoving and yelling and pushing. Annie girl. Damn dog.

So, we walked over to the vets. Everything was perfectly fabulous, the girls in their trot-trot-trot we're-so-happy-to-be-sniffing-new-smells until we arrived at the vets. When I opened the door into the office, both dogs stopped, dug their too-long claws into the cement, shifted their weight backwards, and pulled.

Combined, the two of them weigh 65 pounds. I'm not quite twice their weight, but I know about leverage, as well as friction and traction. Since we were here to have their nails trimmed and butts expressed, I'd win this battle, as I win every battle like this one. Once we were in, both dogs started panting. They were in hell even before we went into the examination room. Great, this was going to be fun.

The office visit wasn't so bad for Bella. She ate treats while the vet looked at her ears, yep, she's deaf, and her eyes, yep, they're cloudy, but no cataracts, and her coat, wow, she looks good for almost 14. He looked at the part of her leg where she'd been gnawing OCD on a spot, and stopped. Oh, yeah, this is bad, he said. Yes, well, I knew that, having had a number of these growths taken off when her teeth were cleaned a few years back. However, she's at them again, they're growing big, she's licking them non-stop, and I'm really tired of cleaning up the blood stains on my carpet. Can we have them removed?

Sure, we can remove them, he answered, then started counting them. Without much effort, he counted nine spots that Bella could reach, and OCD lick a hole into her body. The vet then told me a story about another OCD dog he treated that could not stop licking a wound that started off as a small scratch. Cones, bitter apple spray, bandages, ointments, local anesthetic, splint, cast, nothing helped, the dog licked, gnawed or chewed its way through them all, until it chewed off its foot. It eventually had its leg amputated. As if I needed a reason to have the spots removed. Please. I know how OCD this little dog can me.

Right about this time, the howling started. It started as a small murmur in the back room, and built up to a painful crescendo. Yes, it was Annie, in the other room, having her nails trimmed and hating it. Sigh.

• Log in to read full content