Today is day 10 for Dakota and we celebrated by getting his stitches removed. I wanted to wait a couple of days more, but Dakota had been going to town trying to scratch the awful itch they created, and I wanted to have that abdominal bruising looked at. Turns out day 10 is perfectly fine for suture removal and everything had closed up nicely.
Dakota does have a smallish seroma, which I suspected, but it isn’t large enough to require any treatment. After the stitches were out, there was some fluid oozing in one reddened area so I think it may find its own drain. Sounds nasty, doesn’t it? A couple of days ago Dakota did begin licking the incision and irritated a spot, and this is where the oozing is coming form.
The bruising is ok, although of course no one will commit to saying it’s actually from the surgery. There have been all kinds of caveats issued: It could be a platelet disorder that only last week manifested; it could be internal bleeding from who knows what that just popped up…I don’t think so.
After we got back home, Dakota’s bulldog Evelyn (the worst roommate in the world, remember) tried to snag a bone from his mouth. Evelyn had been left home with at least 5 bones while we were gone, but once we got home the only one she couldn’t live without was the one Dakota picked up. They really went at it for a moment, and I had to intervene. All I could envision was Dakota’s shoulder tearing open and everything falling apart. It was really rather frightening. In retrospect, Dakota now cares if Evelyn wants to steal from him. Several days ago he would probably not have lifted his head to protest.
So the mending continues and I’m hopeful that Dakota will regain more strength every day. He is doing much better outside, avoiding obstacles and not falling down. The worst navigation challenges come from his persistent running into people, especially me. He often doesn’t seem to know what to do with his body and just rams right into my legs. I think he wants me to move out of his way, but I just can’t always do that. He also needs to learn to moderate his speed. I understand why faster is easier for him, but boy is it fast! I’m very sure he can slow down a bit and still keep up good momentum.
Now the challenge will be to keep Dakota quiet for another week so the seroma can resolve. Oh yeah, and he absolutely can’t keep licking at the incision, either. I guess he’s still going to be modeling some tasteful duds for the next week or so.