It's Hard Being Barney - Part 1
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Make no mistake, the fact that this is "Part 1" does not in any way mean that this is the first time that it’s been hard to be Barney. Oh no, it’s been hard to be Barney right from the get-go.

Yes, the part about where we met and fell in love, I’d say that was hard. And then there was that time when Barney accidentally poisoned himself, and the time I accidentally poisoned him, and the time he got lost on a hike in France, and the time he was diagnosed with cancer and subsequently lost a very important body part … yes, I’d say there is no doubt that it is very hard to be Barney.

It just so happens that this is the first thing I’m writing about.  Hence, " Part 1". Don't worry .. there will be more parts.

It even looks like it's hard being Barney

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

It was at the end of March, just before Electric Horseman decided to have his leg amputated and a prosthetic hip implanted (read "hip replacement" - which would take both of us out of circulation for several weeks), that Barney’s vet and I decided it was time to do something about Barney’s bald spots. Barney has enough to worry about without going bald. He’d developed a bald patch about the size of a quarter on his chest about a year earlier and we hadn’t been too concerned, given that there were always things to be more worried about in Barney’s orbit. He didn’t lick it, it didn’t seem to cause him any discomfort or itching, so we just left well enough alone. But over the last several months, a second spot seemed to be going bald next to the first spot.

“It’s time,” said the vet, “to biopsy these sites and make sure there is nothing bad going on.”

Excusé moi?  A biopsy?

I hate that word “bad” where my pets are concerned. We’ve seen “bad” before with this dog, and I did not want to see it again.

“Fine,” I said, “do it.”

Oh no!

Under Barney went, to that happy place that only general anesthesia can take you. He had his chompers cleaned at the same time. No sense wasting a good, deep sleep.

Barney came home with the requisite course of antibiotics after a dental and the wait began for the biopsy results. I was cheered by his vet telling me the samplings “looked OK to him” until he followed that up with “but what do I know, I’m no pathologist” and went back to my worrying.

Fast forward to now, the lovely month of May. The biopsy results were fine, normal, the best I could hope for.

Electric Horseman had a successful hip transplant and is in the throes of the long recovery process. We are adjusting to him healing and working from home, whether he likes it or not.

And Barney has been licking furiously at the bald spots on his chest. What the heck?

“Barney, stop it!”

When English doesn't work, I resort to French.

"Barney, ça suffit!"

When French doesn't work, I resort to the threatening the things he hates most.

“Barney, don’t make me turn you into a cone head, because I will!”

Poor Barney

Oh, how Barney hates wearing the dreaded Elizabethan collar.

“Barney, get over here so I can spray you with Bitter Yecch!”

Oh, how Barney hates getting sprayed with Bitter Yecch!

I was getting really frustrated with the whole thing. What had I done? Apparently I had created a major problem by fiddling with a benign situation … he had never licked at the spots before, and now, by sticking my big nose into it and trying to diagnose something, it looks like I’d created a “hot spot” and was now going to have to tackle a new problem. Sigh.

I just did not have time or energy for this in the midst of taking care of the guy with the new hip. So poor, sweet Barney really did get left out, ignored, neglected, and yelled at. A lot.

Finally one evening I’d had enough. Barney was licking yet again so I grabbed a flashlight and some reading glasses to take a serious look at what was going on. Hell’s bells! I found sutures! Goopy, rotting sutures. No one told me there were sutures that needed to be removed.

Usually as I’m waltzing out of the vet’s with some critter in tow, they tell me if I need to remove sutures in 10 days. Not this time.

I felt like a total heel.

“Barney! Désolé! This is what you’ve been trying to tell me all this time! “ (Have I mentioned that Barney is French and appreciates what few French words I know thrown in?)

The poor dog had 3 annoying sutures at the 3 biopsy sites that he was just trying to lick away. His vet told me the next day that he had used dissolvable sutures, but obviously that didn’t work out so well. I didn’t even think to pay any attention, since I had just had a biopsy of my own (benign, thank you very much) and there were no sutures … so I just ignorantly assumed the same for Barney.

Needless to say, Barney is now much more comfortable and is enjoying being apologized to on a regular basis. He also no longer gives a lick about his bald spots.