His new nickname is Wonder Bay

I'm very excited to report that Bay Asher spent at least 30 minutes exploring the front yard in his cart last night! It was so nice to let him wander around for as long as he wanted without my arm and shoulder suffering for it!


Thank you, Abba, for hearing my heart's cry and answering it!

I Am One Proud Mommy!

Bailey swam last night!!!!! He did such an excellent job and I am so, so proud of him.

I spent most of the day Saturday finishing up getting the yard ready for the pool, laying out the pool, blowing up the top ring, and filling it with water. It was a comedy of errors or mishaps at least, but the thing is finally up! Sunday I added a little more air to the top ring (after replacing the manual pump with an electric one), finished filling the pool with water, and last night, I put Bailey in! I thought the ground where I placed the pool was level, but it turns out that it actually isn't. But that worked to our advantage. I was able to put him in in the "shallow end" and then walk him around to the ladder, where I quickly climbed in with him to reassure him. He had on his life jacket that our vet gave us, and he had those legs kicking! I used the handle on the life jacket to guide him around in circles. Anytime he got near the ladder or the spot where I had put him into the pool (where he could actually touch the bottom with his back legs down and front legs up), he splashed like mad trying to get out but only ended up splashing water all in his face. He did not love that. He only seemed to panic slightly two times. Otherwise, he did fine.

I kept him in for several minutes (I had heard that the hydrotherapy places only let them swim for 4 minutes their first time in, so I kept it short.) and then realized I had no good way to get him out. Getting him in required lifting him over the side of the pool and I barely got him in, but at least he floated. I knew I couldn't just drop him out to the ground. So my wonderful mom brought the picnic table benches over and I set him out onto those and then he jumped down from there. Unfortunately, Mom suffered the brunt of his shaking off the water. Next came the spastic, "I'm wet! I'm wet! I AM WET" running all over the yard, but it was more good exercise for him. :o) When I was setting him out of the pool, I noticed his left leg was really weak but they say this tends to happen when they first start hydrotherapy.

So, I am one relieved mommy to have that first dip behind us and to know that it really went much better than I expected. I had no real problems getting him in or out, and no big fuss from him when I was putting him in. Whew! What a relief!

Of course, the next time I try to put him in the pool, he will know what's coming. We'll see how that goes over...

(By the way, I have NO pictures of any of it, because I was more concerned with surviving what I thought would be a major ordeal. Maybe next time I'll be able to get some pics!)

Hot Fun in the Summertime

Bailey is not a big fan of water. He detests bath time. He has never had the opportunity to swim, so I don't know how he would react to swimming . . . yet. One of the best exercises for dogs with degenerative myelopathy is swimming. Because of course it couldn't be Frisbee catching or tail chasing or tennis ball tricks or anything else that comes naturally to Bailey! So the plan is to start hydrotherapy with Bailey at home. The nearest animal rehab facility is at least 2 hours away, and our vet thinks that Bailey would be freaked out (even more?) by the special hydrotherapy tubs that they use because they are small and he would feel closed in.

The first step was to buy a kiddy pool and get him to sit in it with no water. That went over very well. He got into the pool pretty easily and loved having Mommy sit in it with him and love on him for a while. We did that a couple of times, and he had no problem with it.

Then I added the water.

He was a little more reluctant to get in once he saw the water in the pool. At first, he stood outside the pool and drank the water. I believe he thought he could make it go away if he just drank enough. I managed to wrangle him into the pool and then I sat down in it with him, planning to love on him just like we did before. He would not sit down and was not at all happy being in the water. But then he found a nice little island in the pool where he could place his front feet so that at least not all of his paws were in the water at once.

Yes, he thought it was very convenient that Mommy's legs were there for him to stand on. I kept him in the pool for 30 - 45 minutes, waiting for him to get comfortable enough to sit down. He finally did sit, with me pushing on his rump, which popped back up as soon as I let go. After that, I let him get out.

The second time I put him in the pool with water he did a little better. He did not try to stand on me the entire time, and he would walk around some to follow me as I moved around the pool. After several more dips in the pool, he still won't relax enough to enjoy it, even when he's burning up hot and tired from walking.

We're taking baby steps for now, but the next step won't be baby sized. I bought one of those easy-set above ground pools (thank goodness for Wal-Mart's low prices!) and now I need to get him swimming. Besides getting the pool set up and the filter wired, the biggest challenge is going to be finding a way to get Bailey in and out of the pool without me having to lift him. He is not so heavy that I can't pick him up, but once he is soaking wet, I might not be able to lift him. Maybe once I have the pool set up an idea will come to me . . . .

Home Cookin'

After delaying her start date for 2 weeks, Bailey's personal chef has finally started work. In case you haven't figured it out, I am the chef! I went to Kroger Saturday and bought all the ingredients:

(broccoli, spinach, carrots, green bell peppers, tomatoes, ground mustard, ground ginger, garlic, grilled chicken, tofu, brown rice, EVOO, and Tums for calcium)

Anyone who saw me putting all of these items into my shopping cart would have thought I was a very healthy eater. Obviously, they don't know me!

Monday night, I laid out all the ingredients (because of course I had to get a picture!), then I rinsed everything really well. I actually found boil-in-bag brown rice, so that was easy. I put the broccoli and carrots into a second pan to boil. The spinach went into another pan to cook. I chopped the green bell pepper using my wonderful new chef's knife that my mom got for me from Pampered Chef, because who shouldn't be a pampered chef, right? (Thanks, Mom!) The recipe called for the pepper to be steamed, so I got creative and pulled out a colander, put the pepper in it and held it over the pot of spinach that was putting off lots of steam. Once the vegetables were done, I pressed the garlic, drizzled the olive oil, measured the spices, chopped the tofu, and put everything but the rice into the food processor and pureed it all. Knowing Bailey, I was afraid if I did not puree it, he would pick and choose which things to eat, and I wouldn't have blamed him! The end result looked like this:

It looks like guacamole with rice in it (and one carrot that the food processor did not get). Seeing the end result, I was even more apprehensive that Bailey would actually eat this food. I was encouraged though that for the last several steps, he was sitting right beside me, sniffing each ingredient with interest. So I added some to his regular food (we will be taking the transition to this diet slowly!) and put the bowl back in its holder. I called Bailey, and called him again, and called him again. It wasn't looking too good at this point . . .

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. . . but I think he liked it! So if you're looking for me on Sunday afternoons now, I'll be at home cookin'. :o)