Forest Got Snipped

Sorry lady pups (and let’s face it, male pups too, those horny fellows) Forest is officially off the market.

On November 14^th, little Forest got neutered. We didn’t really have a choice in this matter, the contract we had with the breeder stipulated that Forest had to be neutered before he turned 6 months old. I felt bad making this kind of decision for Forest, they are his balls after all, but I wasn’t against the idea. Nick however didn’t want anything to do with it. He didn’t want to talk about it, hear about it or participate in any planning. He knew it had to be done, but I guess the subject of snipping a male puppy was a little too squeamish for him. Luckily I was able to schedule the procedure to take place while he was out of town on business.

When I was in college, I had a cat named Skylar. When my kitty was neutered, there were no post-operation instructions, no follow-up visits, no extra pain meds, nothing. It all seemed very easy. So I was surprised at how serious this turned out to be for Forest (which Nick would say is a huge understatement). For 10 days, Forest wasn’t allowed to be around other dogs, run, take walks, jump or play rough. I didn’t realize this before I scheduled the procedure, but fortunately Forest got neutered the day after his last obedience class (where he participated in all of the events listed above, and then some).

I had to choose between two types of stitches: one that would disintegrate or fall out on its own but was more fragile, and another that would need to be manually removed by the vet but was sturdier. Forest is a licker, so I choose the latter. The surgery went as expected and the vet gave me a few extra pain meds to give Forest over the next few days. And of course, they gave us the “buster” collar, or as I called it, Forest’s cone collar. I thought dogs wore cone collars so they wouldn’t chew on the stitches, but I guess the main concern, at least in Forest’s case, is that the dog will lick the stitches, thus delaying the healing process.

Forest is a little guy so his cone collar looked like they cut a regular cone in half. The collar part was a little tight, so I had to kinda grab Forest’s face and squeeze his head thru it. I always thought that would freak Forest out, but surprising he just sat patiently while I struggled to get the cone collar on him. There was no chance of the cone falling off, but it had a thin piece of rope around it so you could tie a knot and keep the cone in place.

Now this sounds mean, but it was pretty funny watching Forest trying to get around with this huge cone on his head. He was constantly bumping into the wall or snagging the edge of the collar on a door frame. He could slowly make it down a flight of stairs, but he couldn’t get up any stairs, the bottom of the cone always hit the first step and Forest would stagger back a little and then try again. I ended up carrying him around a lot.

Forest figured out how to sleep with the cone collar on. Unfortunately he was constantly shifting and rearranging himself so the cone made a lot of noise in his crate at night.

I think the saddest part of the whole experience was how Forest acted right after I put the cone collar on him. I think he thought the cone was punishment because he always got really quiet and tried to cuddle as close to me as possible.

I felt horrible about the possibility that Forest felt guilty when wearing the cone collar, but a small part of me was also thrilled that the cone collar made the dang puppy calm down for awhile. Is this how parent’s secretly feel when their kids get sick? Yes, we’re worried and feel sorry for our babies, but gosh it’s nice to have some quiet time around here :)

Forest: I’m sorry for whatever I did wrong, can you please take this damn thing off me now?

Luckily the whole mess is over with. Forest, sans balls, is doing fine and doesn’t seem to be acting any differently. The vet had to shave his downtown region so hopefully the hair will grow back quickly (it looks we’ve been manscaping the puppy). And not exercising has sped up Forest’s weight gain so he’s around 15 pounds now!!! Sniff, the little puppy is growing up.

Forest Got Snipped