Lacey spent Thursday at the vet. She'd been feeling awful for about 2 weeks, had her in once for a check. I thought the pain was due to a bad tooth, the vet thought it was neck pain. We tried Deramaxx, with minimal success. So Thursday she went in for xrays and a dental.
The good news: the xrays show all is fine in her neck area. 
The
bad news: she had "mud mouth." The vet was quite surprised, and said it was all in the back -- way way back. Extensive gum disease, pus, infection,
clumps of tartar and food. She had 8 teeth extracted. In 3 to 5 days,
she is going to feel MUCH better even than she felt when
she went in. The vet was amazed, when they actually got in there, how
bad it was. Dogs have a sort of wisdom tooth way in the back; it only
has one root. Most dogs don't have these; Lacey had both of them. And
once the tartar was removed, they came right out. In front of those are
another 2 sort of like wisdom teeth as well, again only one root.
These also, less than half the dogs have one, Lacey had both. And
again, they were just hanging and came right out. She did have one
3-root molar which was very bad with infection. Once cleaned up, the
roots were totally exposed; these are responsible for abscessing up into
the back of the eye ( a VERY bad thing says the vet) so that one came
out too. A few incisors in front also had to come out.
Lacey
had a full set of teeth, something the vets very rarely see! All those
'sort of wisdom' teeth, lol. Given the condition of her mouth, and in
particular the teeth way in back, vet suspects this was the pain we were
seeing this past week, but time will tell as she heals.
I was
supposed to bring her home and give her 3 pills -- um, no, please give
her a pain injection here and all the others as well. I know my pups,
and this girl does NOT take pills well at all, no way she was going to
let me get them in her after a dental like this!
She started spinning around in the kennel in
excitement when she heard Sugar and I walk in (she heard me talking, and
Sugar had to bark at a dog in the waiting area).
For almost an hour when we got home, Lacey was restless, couldn't seem
to settle anywhere. Whimpered a bit now and again. Then she zonked
out. She was OK'd for some water and food, but she had absolutely no
interest in either.
Lacey had a good night, slept soundly right through.
This
morning, I got about 1/4 cup of moist food in her, by smearing a bit on
her upper lip and letting her lick it; other than that she would not
take it. So then I tried to get the 3 pills in her; got her so worked up and nervous she threw up. Sigh, so I gave up.
I
gave her a bowl of moist food when I fed the others, and she ate about
half, so about a quarter cup again. She isn't settling down, restless,
but she won't come NEAR me now, so not sure I can get any meds in her.
This evening, Lacey ate about half a cup of canned food, and then most of a breaded chicken breast - MY supper! LOL So much for the vet telling me to give her baby food, soft foods, etc. She is definitely feeling better, even without her meds. May the healing continue!
**
I had no idea she had any tooth pain or issues, she has been eating fine and as fast as always. She gave no indication of this issue until the last 2 weeks. I feed a high quality kibble, they regularly get beef marrow bones to chew on, as well as bully sticks and Himalayan dog chews.