Tonight's' picture was taken in July of 2009. Mattie was sandwiched between his best buddy, Brandon and his physical therapist, Anna. The one thing we all learned quickly was that Mattie complied with physical therapy when he had a buddy. Someone to encourage him or to actually do the activities along side him, almost like a competition. To this day, I will always be impressed with Brandon, whose cancer treatment had finished months prior, but loyally came back to the hospital to visit with Mattie. I would define Brandon as a special friend!
Quote of the day: The dog lives for the day, the hour, even the moment. ~ Robert Falcon Scott
We took Sunny to the vet today to get his annual vaccine for leptospirosis. Though this is not a standard of care, I demand Sunny get this shot! What is this? It's a bacterial disease spread through the urine of infected animals. The urine of rats to be exact. About a month into adopting Sunny, I met a dog owner by the waterfront on one of my walks. He told me about the tragic death of his beloved dog. All because the dog drank from a puddle, then contracted leptospirosis and DIED. The infection is that deadly and given that we live in the rat capital of the Country and we have a herding breed which is fascinated by rats, Sunny has NO choice in my book. He gets the shot! I will always remember that dog lover that I met and how traumatized he was, and how guilty he felt for not inoculating his dog.
While at the vet today, we learned that Sunny lost a few pounds. Which was wonderful because I did not get the usual litany of..... your dog is overweight.
While we were talking to the vet, we asked her what breed mixture she thought Sunny was, and we all started chatting about his DNA. I have to admit, I am NOT a big DNA analysis fan for many reasons. But in Sunny's case, she explained that taking our dog's DNA can help guide his medical care. In fact, some breeds require certain medications and knowing more about his background could potentially help us keep him healthy and living longer. So it was that medical component that appealed to me.
They did a blood test on Sunny and we get the results in two weeks. The panel will generate a report that covers:
- Extensive genetic health screening for 150+ conditions covering 16 major body systems, letting us know which, if any, he is at risk for, a carrier, or clear of
- Breed detection for 350+ breeds, types and varieties broken down into a pie chart for percentages and into a family tree going back three generations
- Extensive information about each breed and breed group found
- A predicted weight profile
- A genetic trait analysis
One thing is for certain, we all agree that Sunny is a herding dog of some type. Sunny was the ambassador today in the office. Making friends with everyone and was calm as a cucumber. I learned today as a senior dog, Sunny has to get a well visit every six months! That was a new one for me, and I chuckled because that is more mandated doctor time than even we humans face!
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