Emotional Scars

Thanks to my friend's donation, Naz got his teeth cleaned this week. The good news is that he doesn't do that "chattering" thing to draw cool air over his inflamed gums anymore. Also he eats with much more comfort. I feel rather guilty about the second one: I didn't realize he was eating like that because he was in pain!

The bad news is the little guy has deep emotional scarring from the bladder surgery. He went to his GP happily enough; I've never had difficulty in getting him to go there. When he woke up after the procedure, though, he started moaning right away. In the recovery area, he moaned continually for two hours, which he has never done after a dental before. When he heard my voice after I came in to the office to pick him up, the moans got much louder. The vet tech said that he'd be groggy walking home and would probably sleep the rest of the day, especially as he was kicking up such a fuss about wanting to go home.

He practically pulled Chris all the way home, so I figured he'd crash as soon as we got there. No such luck. Naz lay on the couch between me and Chris and moaned. He varied this with pacing around the place. It looked to us like he didn't want to go to sleep. I can only suppose he was afraid what he might find when he woke up again.

Since this is his fourth or fifth dental over his lifetime and he's never behaved this way before, I can only suppose the bladder surgery left deeper scars than I had supposed. I thought that once the pain was over, it would be over for him, living in the moment as dogs do. Apparently not for Naz, not over this. He kept going until he basically collapsed, shortly before bedtime. We had to wake him up to make sure that he knew we were going upstairs and didn't have a panic attack when he woke up alone downstairs.

He was back to his old self the next morning, but it has me worried. If I can find a way to afford chemo, will that make him even more upset? In that case, is it worth the extra time it would buy him? I don't want him living in fear. I want to buy him time because he's *happy* and doesn't even know he's sick right now, but if treatment itself is going to make him unhappy, what's the point?

I think I will still try the chemo, if I can manage to. At least see how a treatment goes for him. If it is all that upsetting, I can always stop it. But I'm going to have a hawk's eye on his emotional state after each treatment. There's no point to a continued miserable existence.