Within the next week, we were on the phone with some pretty amazing people at AVS in Orange Park. David and I had a vacation planned for that week, so we kept P.D. at the hospital. Two of the doctors at AVSOP had agreed to examine P.D., and our practice owner drove him up there that week for us, while we were gone. PDA was confirmed and surgery was agreed upon. There was just one little problem. P.D. needed to be at least 4.0 pounds for the DVM's to feel comfortable with the procedure and all that it entailed. At that point, P.D. was only 2.7 pounds at 8 weeks. Well, we thought long and hard about whether we should keep this little puppy. If not us, then he would have had to find another foster home until the surgery. Usually with "learning cases" like this, the folks at AVSOP adopt out the patients once they have fully recovered. They agreed that if David and I wanted him, they would let us take him back and only charge us a fraction of the cost of surgery. We agreed to keep him, and they agreed to let the practice owner and I come up and help with the surgery when it was time. We started offering him a lot more food and he was up to 4 pounds in about 2.5 weeks! This is an x-ray taken the week of surgery.
Since we decided to keep him, we had to think of a more suitable name! While our 3 cats are named after characters in the Disney CARS movie, we pulled out the CARS book and started spouting out names. When we got to "Fillmore", we both knew that was the one!! It was official!This photo was taken just a few days before his surgery. Still so skinny!!
Dr. B and I drove up to Orange Park and took Fillmore in to get prepped for surgery. The doctors and techs there were AMAZING!! They were so nice and let me just hang out and observe everything going on. During his surgery, I must admit I was a tad bit nervous. Here was this little 4# puppy, whom we had finally named and had already fell in love with having heart surgery. The doctors did great! Dr. B even went ahead and neutered the poor thing since he was under anesthesia and frankly, at 10wks. and 4#- there wasn't much to remove:):) Here he is, under his CARS blanket with his stuffed dog, waiting to be extubated.
Fillmore stayed in OP a couple of days for recovery. When I went to pick him up, the techs had wrapped his stuffed dog (that I had sent with him for comfort) in a shirt made of vet wrap and had all written get well soon messages to him! Awww!! He did great in the following weeks. Here is a pic of him and his e-collar! Oh, and the tiny polo I got for him the day he had surgery:):)
Since then, he has filled our lives with so much laughter and so many puppy grunts!! We love him so much! He is a friend to everyone he meets, wanting to play. He has a great temperament. He graduated from puppy classes. He is a true gator fan! He loves to play with (i.e. chase) the cats, one in particular! He loves chewing on his vanilla scented rawhide bones and wrapping up in blankets! He has the best smell! Especially late at night when he curls up under a blanket and gets all warm and tries to let us leave him out at night instead of going into his "nighttime" kennel:)
(I still, at times, question why we agreed to this since I know what can happen with dachshunds and their backs.....we see it on a fairly regular basis at work. But, I keep him lean and he is pretty good about not jumping on the furniture, so we will just keep our fingers crossed. I always tell him that he has already had his one major surgery and he's not allowed another.)
Now- for some random pics-
playing with his gator dog
lying in the sun at the lake
Graduating from puppy classes-
Here he is with his birthday hat I made him and with his two new toys he got for his birthday!
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