Under The Knife

Sancho had an appointment with a scalpel yesterday. He started growing a lump on his neck last week. The marble-sized lump just kept getting bigger and bigger. When it threatened to reach the size of a pummelo, I consulted my veterinary manual (yes, I'm one of those people). I didn't come up with any solid answers, but Sancho was pretty sure that it was cancer. He wanted us to know that dog treats were the only thing that could possibly help.

Here's Sancho pre-op:

Offspring: "You have cancer."
Sick, Sick Dog: "Quiet child. Go fetch me a treat. Can't you see I'm dying here and in a car trunk no less?"

On the day before he was scheduled to see a doctor, the lump decreased rapidly in size in an awfully violent manner (think very disgusting). The doctor still wanted to cut him, so the lump (which was back to the size of a marble) was removed yesterday. Sancho spent most of the afternoon working off the effects of the anesthesia by staring blankly at inadamant objects. The dryer seemed to be especially fascinating.

The doctor wasn't really sure what caused the lump ("Frankly, I don't know what the hell it was" - we have a vet with a lot of character), but it was probably a foreign body. Sancho has been known to eat sticks (obviously, we don't give him enough treats), so it would probably be a good bet that he got one lodged in his mouth and it slowly made it's way out of his neck.

Today, Sancho's doing better. He's trying to rip out his stitches and doing a pretty good job of making me feel guilty for putting him through the whole ordeal.