I thought I was a Newfoundland, but apparently…….I am a guinea pig

Hello my name is Bucklersbury Bear, I am a Newfoundland and I live in Kent.

I had this limp, I had managed to carry it for a few weeks but eventually I just had to let it out and limp.

“Look he’s limping again” I heard him say, she immediately grabbed my paw and started sticking her fingers in and out of my paw pads, “I cannot find anything” she said, then,  “hang on a minute I think he has split a nail”

“Oh Buck”, he said, “there is nothing we can do today you are off to kennels”.  I love kennels and off I went for something called a month.

“He’s been limping quite badly” the lovely girl at the kennels said when she was handing me back to them, they looked a bit alarmed and said they would take me off to the vet.

Monday 21st October- I see the vet lady, she was pretty rough with me, pulled this bent that and carried out what she called “aggressive manipulation.”  That was all pretty boring until she did something that sent a pain through me that nearly made my eyeballs fall out. I screamed out in pain.  “Its his shoulder” she said, “we will put him on a course of pain killers, and if there is no improvement we can X-Ray him on Wednesday next week.”

During the next week the pain in my leg seemed to be a bit less of a pain, I was up for my walks and felt more like my own self, but when this Wednesday thing arrived, BANG the pain was back big time.

Wednesday 30th- He was on the phone to the vet lady saying I was limping again.  “Not until next Tuesday now” he said to her, “this is bonkers nearly a whole week to wait”

Tuesday 5th November- “Oy where is my breakfast?” No breakfast and now I am back with the vet lady, “where are you two going?”  They leave me with some lovely girls who rub my ears and make a big fuss of rubbing my very empty tummy, then they put this needle thing in me and wow I’m asleep, drifting and dreaming, wonderfull.

Next thing I know, I am sort of awake, my eyes are so heavy and I have a headache, I try to get up but I am in this tiny cage so best to sleep some more.  “He’s round” I hear one of the lovely girls say, “Hello Buck, open your eyes for me”.  I do as I am asked for a second or two, but the need to sleep takes over.

Now I can hear their voices in another room.

He says, “I’m sorry I just cannot accept that this is going to be him for the rest of his life”  Going to be him? Of course I am going to be me.  What is he talking about?

“He is only five, he cannot spend the rest of his life with a limp and daily painkillers.  I can see the X-Ray showing the the arthritis in his knee joint, but there must be a procedure somewhere that can go in clean it out and give him some quality of life going forward.  What about Noel, surely they must have some keyhole procedure that can be done, even if it only gives him three or four years of normality, we can deal with its return in old age when it is more manageable”

At this point the vet man, (vet lady has now disappeared) got quite heated. “We are quite happy with our diagnosis, with the equipment we have here we are happy with our diagnosis and can see no need for a referral.  We will begin the pain management for a month or so and see how it goes. Now I will get Buck for you”.

Vet man lets me out of the cage and takes me through to them.  I am in a lot of pain, I don’t know why but I did hear the vet man tell them that whilst “under” what ever that is, they had been “very aggressive in their manipulation of my joints”.  Your telling me, god this hurts.

As he handed me over the vet man said, “that limp is pretty bad, I haven’t seen him walk before”

Very Tired now, but more to follow