8.29.2014

August 29, 2014

White Dog jumped off of her place on my chair to give me more room to work. It was amazing how naturally and quickly the entire pack moved to respond to the emergency at hand.

Sachi, our boy with the scarred and webbed throat, started coughing. At first Candace and I thought he was about to vomit. But the coughing turned to raspy wheezing and in just instants into a dry choking. Candace noticed his tongue starting to discolor. She grabbed him up and thrust him into my waiting arms where I looked in his mouth as I maneuvered him into position to clear his airway.

Candace gathered the nervous pack into the kitchen, softly talking them through what was happening. She quickly sent Daisy, Sachi's girlfriend, and her sister out to the yard for they were starting to panic bark.

I squeezed our Little Man's ribcage and pressed up on his diaphragm...and listened. There seemed to be nothing solid there, only phlegm. Sachi squirmed as he gasped. I put him across my knee face down and massaged his middle back using the thumping methods that we learned for Puff. His color revived but he was still struggling to draw breaths.

Michael came up to discover the emergency in progress and sat on the floor in the kitchen to try to help keep the White Dog Army calm. His fear telegraphed and made them start to whine. He quickly figured out his best help would be to go to his room until we called. Sachi stopped trying to bark a greeting to his friend and the others quieted.

As the heaving stopped, I switched to more soothing massage movements. Candace grabbed the Compsure chews and discovered the bag empty except for crumbs. She tore the bag open and gathered together the crumbs. Sachi is our smallest boy at 10lbs so we figured the crumbs (about half a chew) would provide some calming value. Sachi licked the crumbs from her hand.

He laid across my knee still panting but clearly past the trauma. We decided to let him attempt dinner, supervised, and half hoped he would vomit to clear whatever the problem had been. Michael came back up and we resumed our normal dinner preparations.

Sachi ate his entire meal and then sat with us breathing normally, before going out to the sunroom where he gave himself over to the herbal Composure and slept.

He is fine now. His color is good. His breathing is normal. The White Dogs have sniffed, evaluated him and pronounced him to be OK. He gave us all quite a scare.

White Dog is relieved. We all are. And we want to take this opportunity to remind every member of our blog family to take the time to learn the basics of pet CPR and cardio/pulmonary massage. Learn it, practice it, and practice some more until it becomes instinctive...you just never know.

6 comments:

KB said...

I am so glad that you knew what to do. I once learned (back when I had a SAR dog) but I'm no longer in practice. Tonight, R seemed like he was choking ever so briefly, and I prepared to go into action. Fortunately, it wasn't needed because I'm sure that I wouldn't be as good at it as you are.

I hope little Sachi continues to feel better.

Angel Ginger Jasper said...

So glad you were able to help but you must all have been so scared. I am so relieved it was a good outcome. X

Brian's Home Blog said...

Dang that's sure scary but we are sure glad all is okay once again.

Angels Amber and Max DaWeenie and Mom said...

Whew....glad everything is OK. How scary. Lucky you were home when this happened.

meowmeowmans said...

That must have been so scary. I'm glad Sachi is okay, and that you and Candace were able to help him.

Little Reufus said...

OMD. So scary. I'm so relieved that little Sachi is ok.

whssshhhhhew.

wif lubbs from Little Reufus