Sheltie Gathering Jan 2012! Juliet third dog from the left!

It’s all gooooood! Mother says that though it’s been only a month since my neuter procedure she has seen some improvement in my behaviour. Don’t know what she’s talking about. I’m already an angel!

Pffftt. You gave Mother hell! I see her huddled in the corner, rocking herself and eating her hair while she mumbles “Romeo.. Mark.. Hump.. Noooo”. *giggles*

You’re making things up.

It’s true! I swear on rainbows and unicorns! She said she felt like she was fighting you all the time. It was so exhausting for her! And she worried about her relationship with you, but of course I reminded her she still had ME!

Well things have changed. Mother said I didn’t bother anyone or try to hump any dog (even my girlfriends!) the whole time we were at the recent Sheltie gathering! And no time outs for bad behaviour. And she said when I came bounding towards her from the other end of the dog run when she called for me, she wanted to drop to her knees and cry out in joy. *beams* Oh oh and at home, I don’t mark over your pee anymore! *double beams*

Whatever. I still rock more.

[Photos of R&J at the January 2012 Sheltie Gathering organized by SGShelties.com courtesy of Nicole, Thian Yong and ???! THANKS!

Ball picture further below! Apologies for the yellow tone. Bad lighting!]

[Show as slideshow]

[Keep scrolling for the royal jewels.]

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Balls look shrivelled, definitely feels like empty saggy pouches.

Wound has healed over completely! Sutures absorbed!

[Other ball updates: 48 hours after surgery ; 60 hours after surgery ; 5 days after surgery ; 1 week after surgery]

Scroll down for pictorial proof.

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One week on, Romeo’s suture wound has just about healed completely and his balls are returning to its original colour. They are also less swollen! Woooooottt!

Day 7

[Other ball updates: 48 hours after surgery ; 60 hours after surgery ; 5 days after surgery ; 1 month after surgery]

You were such a baby the first few days that Mumsy had to get painkillers (Rimadyl) from the vet for you on the 3rd day!

I’m ignoring you. ANYway, Mother took more pictures of my balls of course. If you really must, you can check them out below. Sigh.

Eeeewwww….

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Day 3

Day 4

Day 4 again

Day 5

Romeo’s feeling muuuuch better now. He’s not trying to run away from his own butt anymore and is no longer using the e-collar. He does lick his bits a little but not excessively so I’ve left him be. He’s no longer being carried up the stairs, and he’s trying to play with Juliet who is more than happy to oblige! I’ve been intervening and keeping that to a minimum though!

The suture wound looks good and clean. No sign of infection! It is healing well. Phew!

His “balls” are less swollen too and have gone a purpley red tinge. I guess his body is slowly reabsorbing the ball that collected there! The bruising around his penis has also subsided alot.

Yay finally getting some much needed uninterrupted sleep!

[Other ball updates: 48 hours after surgery ; 60 hours after surgery ; 1 week after surgery ; 1 month after surgery]

Teehee!

So. Not. Funny.

Almost 60 hours in (from the time of surgery) and his balls are starting to look like this (in colour and everything):

A rambutan (click to find out what the heck it is)

What the..

It is predicted by Mumsy that they will soon look like this (again, in colour and shrivelly-ness):

A raisin

According to sources, a bruise goes through a rainbow of colours before it heals.

1st and 2nd day – bright red!

3rd to 5th day – purpley, black

6th to 7th day – green (ugh)

8th to 9th day – yellowy brown

2-3 weeks – back to normal!

Looks like Romeo has a loooong way to go!

*groan*

Oh! Actual picture of Romeo’s rambutan is below.

Look at your own risk! *shudder!*

Daddy says Romeo is a porn star, what with all these pictures of his private parts on the internet! Heehee!

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Does this remind you of something?

Icing the bruised balls seems to help. Because it was tender to the touch, I got Romeo to sit on a cloth covered pack of frozen peas instead, and he does that willingly. He must really like it. Doesn’t want to get up. Tried a towel rinsed in warm water, but that was not as well received!

He is sleeping soundly now for periods longer than 30 minutes. I hope this means we both get a decent night’s sleep! Fingers crossed!

[Other ball updates: 48 hours after surgery ; 5 days after surgery ; 1 week after surgery ; 1 month after surgery]

Rest in peace ballsies!

[Romeo was neutered on 27 December 2011.]

If you want to see a picture of what his “down there” looks like now, after 48 hours from time of surgery, keep going and read the rest of this post.

If not, STOP HERE. DO NOT SCROLL DOWN ANY FURTHER.

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Ample warning has been given – if you proceed further, you shall be responsible for all nightmares and trauma you might get from seeing the picture. If you are chaste and haven’t seen balls before, now may not be a good time. If you are male and squirmish, you might not want to look either!

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Last chance!!

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Alrighty then..

For anyone who is interested, for whatever reason (because you are pervy or just curious), here’s a picture of my well hung boy’s “down there” area 48 hours after the surgery. The suture wound is looking good and clean, but there is some bruising (apparently common, especially with older dogs since they have more blood vessels in the balls).

For educational purposes – The incision (small 2cm one in Romeo’s case) was made at the base of the schlong and the gonads are pushed out of the ball sacs through the cut and removed and all the left over bits are tied off. Romeo was stitched up with dissolving stitches so no need to return to have them removed.

Romeo is feeling some pain because he sometimes acts like he is trying to run away from his own backside, before realizing he can’t, then sitting down abruptly, then lying down to try and lick at the area.

He has on a Kong Cloud collar to try and prevent that. Can’t say that it works very well in this case because my boy is abit of a contortionist and can bend in weird ways to reach his balls despite the collar. I have a backup clear plastic Elizabethan collar (e-collar) for times when I have to leave the house or leave him with anyone that is as observant as an earthworm.

Earthworms are blind.. getit??

Anyway, Romeo is eating and drinking well. Barks and is generally acting as he usually does save that he’s a bit more restless probably due to the discomfort and soreness he’s feeling in his scrotal area. A couple more days and I’m hoping the pain will subside and he’ll be more himself.

Interesting thing I observed so far – he tried to mark over Juliet’s freshly peed spot, but instead of leaving just a wee bit of pee (as he used to), he let out a whole damn puddle, like he couldn’t hold it back? I’m sure the surgery affected his peeing control to some extent. Shall see if that  changes as he gets better.

Oh, also, Juliet has been such a good sister! She has been leaving Romeo alone and hasn’t gone to annoy him like she usually does. She only tried once to chew his head, but backed off and didn’t try again when I told her not to. Good girl Juju!
[Other ball updates: 60 hours after surgery ; 5 days after surgery ; 1 week after surgery ; 1 month after surgery]

Mumsy woke us up bright and early today to take us to the National Dog Walk this year. She never goes for these things but they organised, amongst other carnival like things, the Singapore Open Championship in Agility and she entered us in for practice.

Yes except it was far too hot to work so I spent most of my time in the ring posing for the many photographers and trying to get out of the ring!

Mumsy mentioned. Tsk. At least I finished the course (more or less)!

*shoots Juliet a dirty look* Anyway, the sun must have gotten to Mother’s head because she later on came to us a bit weepy and hugged us and mumbled something about not dying.

I think she said something like a small silky terrier died at the place because it was running around off-leash and disturbed a rottweiler that was drinking water. The rottie’s dad did the responsible thing by muzzling his dog, but of course he had to take it off to let his dog drink water. The silky’s mom however, must be regretting her decision to let her doggie off leash! Rest in peace, silky.

Yes rest in peace. I know Mother has only seen 2 dead dogs before so she was pretty shaken when she saw the silky and witnessed the silky’s mom wailing at the vet over the dog’s lifeless body.

Let it be a reminder that you should never let your babies off leash at such events and you should always watch your doggies! There’s no need to show off that your dog doesn’t need a leash, there’s no need to prove anything to anyone. What matters most is the safety of your babies! There’s a time and place for everything, and that was certainly an unfortunate and inappropriate time and place to let your dog wander around on its own. Every parent is responsible for his dog. If you don’t watch your dog, no one will!

It sounds like it could have been easily prevented. I guess that’s why Mother said she doesn’t like events like this.

Too stressful for her. She’s got enough white hairs as it is!

Mother took me to Sentosa recently to look at a possibly wedding dinner venue (she didn’t like it in the end) and we were making our way to my favourite “exhibit”, the giant turtles. On the way there, we had to pass a forested area, and as we were walking closer, a monkey appeared. It looked male and it was big. Mother muttered something about it possibly being the leader or alpha of the rest of the monkeys we could hear behind the trees. She eyed the monkey very cautiously, who had made its way down the tree and onto the road. We were less than 10 meters away! Mother stopped of course when she saw the monkey on the road, worried about going further. I don’t know why though coz I can surely take him on!! GRRR *strikes macho pose*

Next thing I knew, Mother turned around and walked back where we came from. I wouldn’t let it go of course and constantly turned around and started to growl and bark abit, which alarmed Mother and she hushed me and tried to distract me from the monkey. Mother turned around at one point and saw that the monkey was hissing, baring teeth and started to come closer. She picked up the pace and practically dragged my “ready for a fight” ass away. Thankfully (to mom) the monkey did not follow.

Mother said her heart was pounding and she was mentally preparing herself to fight the monkey and keep me from harm. I was thinking of all the ways I could tear that monkey apart!! I don’t know why Mother thinks she needs to protect me. Pfft. I am MANLY MACHO RAMBO ROMEO. I can take that puny primate!

After her heartbeat returned to normal, she wondered what we did that could have ticked the monkey off. Then she burst out laughing.

“What? What, Mother?!”

“I think the monkey thought YOU were an intruding monkey. You’re the same colour as he was! And furry! And about the same size! Teeheehee. You look like this! Hahaha! Mommy’s little monkey boy! ”

“…… *grumbles*  I think that monkey’s friggin’ blind.”

That would be me.

The Orthopedic Foundation for Animals sent a test result slip that said “This dog is homozygous N/N with two NORMAL copies of the gene associated with Degenerative Myelopathy (DM) susceptibility.” To which Mother went “Normal? What does that mean??” and proceeded to tear through the accompanying explanation of results. Of all the dogs OFFA has tested so far, dogs with test results of Normal have never been confirmed to have DM. Normal means I can only transmit normal (non-DM) genes to offspring and it’s unlikely I will ever develop DM. Woohoo!

Some dogs will get the result “Carriers” (meaning they may or may not have DM themselves but their offspring might, especially if they are paired with other Carriers I guess), others will get the result “At Risk” (meaning that they will most likely have DM, if no symptoms show, then as they age, and they will also pass the mutated gene to their offspring.   

WOOHOO! CEEEE-LE-BRATE TONIGHT COME ON!

“Wassup mum” say I, lazily licking my paw.

“It’s here!! Oh my god I love it when people are so friggin’ efficient! I get so impatient about these things,” as she tears open the envelope.

“Wassat mum” I go, examining my well endowed maleness.

“Remember I told you I was going to test your DNA for Degenerative Myelopathy and you freaked out and worried yourself pale about scalpels and needles? It’s here!!” Mother exclaims, pulling out 2 sheets of paper and a dubious looking rectangular strip that says ‘Sterile Foam Tipped Applicator’.

I gulped thinking about all the places that swab can go.

“The DIY DNA test kit from the Orthopedic Foundation for Animals run by the University of Missouri has arrived! I’m gonna swab your mouth and collect alot of saliva and cheek cells to put on a little card then courier it back to them to test if you have degenerative myelopathy!” she explains as she reads the documents.

I heave a huuuuuge sigh of relief and allow my jewels to drop back down again. “Must I Mother?”

“Yes of course you must! It’s almost impossible to test of it here and testing for it and getting a negative result will give me much needed relief! I’d like to know if you’re going to get worse my boy, if I should start building ramps and thinking about getting you wheels or whatever.” Mother snaps on rubber gloves.

“Now open wide.. AAAAAHHHHH”