read part one.
the Sarge doesn't deal well with me being frantic, so he agreed to get a ride to come home right away (we share a car). i took a few deep breaths and decided i had to do something; i couldn't risk her having another puppy upstairs (where is was neither dark nor warm and certainly not without draft. a few days earlier, i crafted a little box with high sides into a drop place under the door of the doghouse, in case the puppies fell out. i went inside, put on my gloves and picked up the box, and headed upstairs to face the scene again.
i walked more carefully this time, observing that there was no stain on the landing of our steps and the poop must have been a result of pushing. the small mess in front of our bathroom door was also mostly on the surface. when i entered our room, i noticed a few things.
first, the mess wasn't actually that bad; the pillow had absorbed most of the liquid (disgusting, right?). second, the puppy had rolled nearer to gracie.
i mentally prepared myself to get rid of a stillborn puppy as i slowly and carefully picked it up.
IT MOVED!
i audibly breathed a sigh of relief at my first grandchild who had survived labor, and reveled in that relief for a while before i came back to reality. there was still a dog in labor on my floor, and a puppy with a partially chewed umbilical cord in my hand. it was an amazing feeling, finally holding a puppy that just that morning had been kicking at my hand through my dog's belly.
gracie was totally cooperative and calm as i picked her up and put her in my little box with her puppy. she watched me as i carefully marched her down the stairs. i felt mostly prepared for the rest of this process (especially considering that dogs mostly have it covered), so i was growing more confident with each step. at least i was there. at least i knew it was coming. at least she trusted me enough to let me help her. at least. at least. at least. it was my mental pep talk.
i put her in the doghouse and set the puppy down next to her. she continued to clean it and gnaw on the umbilical cord while i organized myself. i had a food scale (which previously aided in my weight loss... let me just say... no more!), a box of gloves, a nasal bulb syringe (snot sucker haha), puppy pads, and a stack of old towels and face towels. i went out to the garage to get a few folding chairs and sat and waited.
gracie was a total champ. i could physically see her having her contractions, but she never even offered up a whine. the second puppy came shortly after i took her downstairs and i realized quickly that we would have very colorful litter! the first was white, but the second was dark brown! the actual delivery is pretty amazing. they come out in a little sack, which the mom chews through. she also eats the placenta and chews off and eats the umbilical cord.
the Sarge got home before number three, and witnessed the birth of a light tan-ish colored pup. at this point, i think i ought to start recording their weights and sexes. i ask my husband (still not totally calm at the point, by the way, so i guess i actually asked in a mix between ordering him around and begging him) to call kelly so she could come over and help me. i have the Sarge grab a notepad and take some notes. i pick up the first, the white one, and look between the lower legs and declare it a boy. the second, dark brown, had the same business going on down there, as did the third, the tan baby. i begin to get into the swing of things but am essentially a nervous wreck.
mind you, we have no idea how many puppies there will be! who knows how long this will last!
so now, i realize this will not be the calm, video taped and photo documented life altering youtube experience that i envisioned. i'm watching this alternate reality unfold in front of me, in which i go from being mother of one dog to two, two to three, and on and on, with no end in sight.
kelly arrives and suggests that we label them, which is why in some of the pictures you see those tags around their necks. we thought perhaps there would be one or two that looked similar and wanted to be able to tell them apart. she inspects those already born, to which one has been added, a second white puppy that i labeled a boy along with the others. well, apparently i'm an idiot because they are all girls. their little areas looked like two tiny little balls... i didn't know what i was looking for! i felt ridiculous, but the good news is that my inability to determine sex really lightened the mood.
we took gracie out before she delivered two more pups, a brown boy with a white mark on his head and a beautiful vibrant reddish-brown girl. the last presented a little problem -- gracie had some trouble pushing her out, and we had to really rub her to get her breathing on two separate occasions. it was so hard to watch. i asked what kelly did if a puppy was born dead .. she essentially just throws them away. :((
well, gracie was still pushing and i had six puppies already attached to her bosoms. it has been all of about an hour and a half, which is extremely fast it seems, so we figured we had to run into at least one bump in the road. we took her outside a few times to try to encourage the labor, but without any success. everyone stayed around until about 3 pm (two hours since the last push). kelly had to go and the sarge had to return to work. all i could do was wait.
kelly advises me that if she continues to push, a vet visit would be in order. and i agree. i asked her when she would make that move and she gives me the heart breaking answer that she would have already gone, but that i shouldn't worry because she is extremely cautious (as the puppies are a source of income). she encourages me to wait and pray, and if by 6 there was no puppy and gracie continued to push, i should find a vet.
so, i start calling around. i ask the vet offices around here what the worst case scenario would be and how much that would cost. kelly warned me that it would be more expensive here, so she gave me information for a vet about an hour and a half away from us in LA county. i called the closer vets first and sure enough, the c-section procedure started at $1500 -- JUST for the procedure. no office visit, no meds, no nothing. that was simply not an option. even her vet in riverside started at $800.
in panic again, i spent several hours emailing her and calling her about the likelihood of gracie's survival, how many more puppies could be in there, and how i could afford what seemed to be inevitable. her final suggestion came around 7pm - a place in san bernadino where the vet was reasonably priced, even for a surgical procedure. she estimated $350 or so. let's just say even that was pushing it in our financial situation.
and they didn't open til 6:30 in the morning. almost 11 hours away.
all we could do was wait.
part three coming soon...
as well as an update on my real life. maybe lol.
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