We adopted Callie on Feb 16th, 2013.
On Feb 17th, Callie started coughing.
We walked out of the Humane Society doors with a very snuggly puppy. Just as with our cats, I was amazed they let us out the door without some sort of parenting test. We walked out with the puppy, a crate and a leash.
We had a great first night with her. She was tired, and didn't bounce around a lot, but it had been a long time since I had a puppy and I thought maybe she was just tired from her big adoption day. She had just been spayed a few days before, it make sense all she wanted to do was snuggle and sleep.
The next day, my Dad came over to help do some work on our new house. When my Dad met Callie, it was love at first sight. Since their first meeting, Callie and Grandpa have been inseparable.
We took Callie out into the backyard, and all of a sudden, Callie started coughing. It was worse than coughing, it was gagging. We thought she had a stick caught in her throat, she had been nawing on a stick in the backyard. My Dad took her in his arms and started to pat her back, reassuring her it would be ok.
I called around and found an emergency vet and warned them we were coming, Callie just kept coughing/gagging/chocking; this little 8 pound puppy was so miserable and couldn't breathe.
We rushed her to the emergency vet. I held her as Andrew drove, it was the worst 20 minutes of my life driving to that vet's office. This little thing was so dependent on us, and we had just met her less than 24 hours ago.
After we were rushed into a room, the vet came to see us right away. He checked her over, and said she had kennel cough. Kennel cough is very similar to Whooping cough in humans...and whopping cough in an infant....it was not ideal. We quickly put her on antibiotics and cough medicine and called the shelter to warn them for the other dog's safety.
Poor Callie took several weeks to recover. We had to increase her antibiotics a few times before she finally started getting better. She would just lay in her crate looking at us with that sad face, she was too tired and sick to get up and play for the longest time. The cough medicine was not strong enough, so we had to put her on Robitussin. Poor little dog, she was so hopped up on meds she could barley lift her head.
We really thought she was going to die, she was sick for so long, just laying in her crate giving us those sad eyes.
But then, one day, she turned around. It was slow, but she started to be interested in toys and then she was awake for more then 2 hours a day. She has been a very spoiled dog ever since.
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