In general, I find feces to be quite disgusting. I think this is a normal attitude and quite conducive to good hygiene practices. However, I used to be concerned that when I have children, I’ll be too grossed out to do essential tasks like change diapers. Turns out I have nothing to worry about, since Lalu has urinated and defecated on me every few hours since I returned from Delhi night before last, and it hasn’t fazed me too much.
For a little bit of context, our little pup has some kind of gastrointestinal infection; it was just a matter of time, since he will eat literally anything he can on the street, no matter how diligent we try to be about preventing it: flowers, wrappers, rocks, other dogs’ poop, bricks, etc. I’m making light of it now because I’m home and he’s doing better, but I was scared out of my mind when I was in Delhi and our beloved PAs were taking care of him (they did an amazing job).
Being the daughter of a doctor, I put a lot of faith in medical care (human and canine), but Patna veterinary care has a lot wanting. For starters, the vet I’ve been going to is a two-room shop/clinic tucked down a pretty sketchy alley, which is only open from 11am-1pm. The alternative, the “Dog Hospital” around the corner from our place, is sometimes open around 7pm, for a little while (also a two-room shop/clinic). I chose this place because the vet mostly speaks English and thinks it’s admirable, rather than horrifying, that we adopted a street dog. Maybe those are insufficient qualifications, but it’s a start. He was also the first vet to diagnose a condition other than “cold.” And, you guessed it, by “cold” they mean “suffering from a cold temperature.” Because apparently being too cold causes you to vomit and defecate spontaneously (!!). And it somehow only affects the be-sweatered domesticated dogs, rather than the street dogs sleeping outside every night.
Today and yesterday, I brought Lalu in to be treated. The procedure basically consisted of the vet’s assistant dragging a wooden bench outside onto the dirt in front of the shop, hanging an IV from the door and filling him up with a wide variety of medicines (including three different antibiotics, two anti-vomiting drugs, and several other “vitamins”). Never in my life have I heard Lalu scream in such utter terror as when the vet’s assistant approached him with the needle. I hope to never hear such a terrible sound again. I ended up holding him on my lap, with a towel over his face, stroking him continuously for over an hour. I certainly don’t blame him for his fear – he’s too dumb to connect the medicines he’s receiving to feeling better later. Unless he gets much worse, today will be his last day of intense medication.
And it’s not like this is world-class medical care. Not long after we settled in on the bench outside the shop, the vet’s assistant put what I assume is his own assistant in charge, a boy who could not have been older than 10. And since he was so young, he held the IV needle improperly, causing the liquid to build up in Lalu’s leg rather than entering his vein, which was very painful for Lalu (the assistant eventually intervened). And then when all the fluids were finished and pressure needed to be applied to the wound to prevent it from bleeding, the boy reached for a used cotton swab on the ground (which Lalu had already diarrhead all over) – and I intervened. Yikes.
On the plus side, Lalu certainly got some bad bugs out of his system… all over me. Yesterday, I hired a cycle rickshaw to return to our apartment (Rs. 50 for 2km! I was clearly desperate), and Lalu proceeded to have diarrhea all over me and the rickshaw (oops; guess he got his money’s worth). While trying to flee the understandably angry cycle driver, I called Jeff and asked him to bring a bucket and towel down to the street in front of our building, since Lalu was completely covered in feces, and gave him a quick once-over before running inside and sticking him under the shower (he’s had an average of two baths a day for the past 3 days).
Today, I anticipated that Lalu might have an adverse reaction to his treatment, but wisely neglected to warn the colleague who came with me, since he might not have let me carry Lalu back to the apartment with me on the back of his motorcycle if he knew the consequences (that may have been unethical; my apologies). So I laid a towel down over my lap and held Lalu in place, with his butt hanging off to the side in case he had a case of the runs. Of course, I neglected to consider that, being male, Lalu would pee toward the center of my lap, so I was rewarded for my efforts with a soaked lap and towel (the bike was thankfully untouched).
Who knows what tomorrow (or tonight!) will have in store for us… Honestly the shining light in this whole experience (besides the fact that he is noticeably improving) is how incredibly generous and understanding our colleagues have been in doing everything they can to help make him better – from taking him to the vet when we were gone, to sitting up all night with him, to going to the butchers to get him food – without them, our pup (and we) would be in deep… trouble.
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