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Saturday, January 14, 2012

Loki

I love my dog.

There. That is my disclaimer for writing a post entirely about Loki.

He hurt one of his legs the other day. And my response to his pain was different than I thought it would be. I'm a nurse so I see people in some kind of pain basically every day I work. Now, I view myself as an average-ly compassionate nurse and I do what I can to help alleviate whatever is ailing my patients. But, when all the tricks have run out, I give my patient the call light and tell them that I hope whatever I did helps whatever their suffering may be and I leave the room and continue about my shift.

My response to when my husband is in pain is usually "take an advil and let's see how it is in the morning."

So I was a little surprised when my dog's pain brought tears to my eyes and was all I could think about for awhile. Maybe it was because he relies on us to care for him (an argument that could be made for my patients and my husband in a sense); maybe it was because he couldn't really tell us what was wrong. Whatever the case, Loki's pain made me sad and worried.

He seems fine now though and when he went to the vet for his shots yesterday, he was declared "fit as a fiddle."

So, when, during into our walk today, he began limping, I was distressed. Granted, it was a little humorous when he started hopping about on three legs, but after about a block of watching this, I gave in and began carrying him home. And yes, I did feel a little stupid carrying my dog those couple of blocks. But I thought it was worth it - until we got home and he walked just fine. Maybe he just didn't like the snow ...

Wimp.




1 comment:

Michelle said...

My old dog Tomah would do the same thing. She would prance around high stepping in the snow for a little while, then her feet would get to cold and she would alternate which foot she wouldn't walk on until she would just fall over face first into the snow.