Filbert and the Vet Visit

love and responsibility

I love my dog.  Next to my wife and my three sons, I love him best.  He's a wiener dog.  I wag when he wags and feel bad when he huffs his food and has an empty bowl.  I scratch him and rub on him when I can, and tolerate him in the bed with me, up against my side when I read.  He's what's meant by the word, companion, and he adds joy to our lives.  What more can you ask?  I could list what he's lacking, but he wasn't acquired to be a guard dog or a duck retriever or sheep herder.  If you saw him you'd be amused.  Good boy!

So, imagine how I felt yesterday when the vet rain a comb through Filbert's hair and found fleas. She raked a few off on the stainless steel table, squishing one with a metal tool.  See the speck of blood?  Her look and tone was similar to a doctor on site at a makeshift hospital in Cairo on the morning news, but worse.  How could I let my dog get like this, she seemed to be saying.  

I wasn't thinking, "Oh, my, he has fleas." I already knew that.  His meds weren't working.  He'd been scratching and I'd combed a few fleas at home.   I'd called to say I wanted to buy a drug called, Comfortis, which friends had told me did the trick.  The receptionist told me that the vet would only prescribe the meds if Filbert was given a "medical exam."  So, in the office I went, Filbs in tow.   He was nosing for the bowl of treats on the nearby table as soon as we got there, oblivious to the pens full of dogs just steps away, the agony of broken limbs, open sores and surgeries behind those closed doors.  He'd left his testicles back there, but didn't seem to remember.

I flashed back to a recent visit to a dental hygienist to get my teeth cleaned who'd said,  making me look into my mouth in a mirror, "You've got a little gum disease.  See how the gum's receding?  You need a teeth cleaning!"  In both instances I thought, "No shit," but said, "Ok."  She'd poked me with a steel pick thing and I bled, on cue.

He'd been taking flea pills every month.  I administer them to him.  He doesn't get the box down and eat one on the fifteenth.  Like the water bowl, that's my part of the deal, and telling him how much I love him and showing it regularly, looking in his wonderfully expressive, dark brown eyes and making foolish "I adore you," noises.

"Ok," I said, "Can we get the prescription now?"  Filbert knows there are lizards loose in our yard and I suddenly had a craving for a Mocha Frappe, and planned to buy a new, shallow plastic pool at WalMart for Filbert.  (Did your Mom take you to Dairy Queen when you'd been cooperative in the doctor's office as a kid?)  "No," the vet said, "first we have to give Filbert a medical exam."  I knew where this was headed, but couldn't really object, could I?  Here came the car lot sales manager walking around my trade-in, pointing out the dings, the dental hygienist at play in my mouth.

It was worse than a car lot.  He'd gained a few pounds since his last visit.  "Dachshunds have a history of back problems and extra weight can increase the risk of injury."  Another, no shit, and we haven't gotten into the meat of the exam, which started with a tail lift and thermometer insertion. (It doesn't hurt, but dogs do look back in surprise.) She seemed to enjoy it.  "Good boy!" she said.  Needs a wellness program.  Nails too long.  Needs teeth cleaning, dental x-rays.  Needs bloodwork to check for heart worms.  Had a flu vaccine?  Lepto? ( I sure as hell wasn't going to ask what Lepto is.)  Yada, yada and oh, she was so patient with me, the guilty Dad.  Filbert wanted some downage and to regain his lap seat in the car.  Never felt better. Here, let me scratch that one spot...

I took a problem teen son to a special boarding school in Maine where the focus was on the parents, not the kids.  Made my son feel better about himself.  I could see it on his face.  With a dad like me how could he have done good things?  Guilty Mom and Dad!  Later, after a long introductory day, in a candle light group meeting, the school headmaster gave a pitch for extra financial contributions like a TV preacher, after they'd tried to make you feel bad about your kid taking drugs.  We'd all "shared" in a big group circle.  Many parents cried.  We, the 'rents, had failed our kids.  Now it was the school's turn, and what was a few more dollars to help insure the very best for our children, poor babies?  The goal…the new building.  Artful architectural renderings on the wall.  You'll feel better if we fix your problem.  Ten thousand more?  They helped us hold the mirror.

Same deal at the vet's office and at the dental hygienist's.  "Look what you've done!"  

At this point in the story you'd be right to treat me like a dog trainer and say, "Whoa, David!  No! Quit barking!  Hunt close in here!"  

I'm like some old fart retiree with a bad hip and a story for it.  I've gotta stop.  It's too aggravating.  You don't want to hear the details.  Nutshell:  It was all about a "treatment plan," like a chiropractor's, and a "senior wellness program," and a "CBC/S-Chem/T4/HW Canine," and on and on for three pages.  On the last page it was suggested that I "accept and agree to the terms of this estimate."  Total price was $505, not including the flea pills, which were $17 each, or another $105 for six months.  A long single-spaced letter was included…" pre-anesthetic bloodwork, lepto vaccine, anti-inflammatory medications," and on and on.  "No," I told her in the office, "I'm not going to brush his teeth daily.  Picking up poop and vomit is as far as I go."

Back in our car, with Filbert looking for cracker bits under the seat, I had a talk with him.  "Filbs, ol' boy, we need to get home and find someone to hold you and give you treats while I clip your nails.  I'll see about buying you some of those cookie bones that are supposed to help clean your teeth.  We're not doing all that other stuff.  You're a wonderful dog and I love you, as you know all through your body and mind, but that's all you are.  There have been many furry companions before you and there will be others if I outlive you.  I know, it's tough to hear.  No, it's not tough to hear?  You don't really care?  Quit licking me!  Get down!  You love me anyway, and know I'm the lead dog around here?  Good boy.  

Another thing I promise you, Lad, as sad as it may be:  if your back goes out completely and you lose control of your bowels and bladder and are in pain--I can tell if you're in pain if there is a smidgeon of hesitancy about eating your food--I'll take you with me out in the back yard and you can lie nearby on your blanket and lick a bowl of ice cream while I dig you a nice, deep hole, right next to the spot where your old Uncle Dog sleeps, the one who had the   $3,000 back surgery.  It'll take a while and I'll cry a lot, but you'll understand.  It's a special loving spot there by the avocado tree and the back gate, so you can feel all the comings and goings.  While you're eating ice cream I'll slip up behind you with the .22.  No veterinarian's office for us, that stainless steel table.  All you'll know is the ice cream, I promise.   You and I, we'll do this immensely sad thing together. 

The pest control people are coming to "treat" the house and yard for fleas, for $300.  Filbert's "on" the Comfortis.  It's all I can do for now.