Home again.

Brina is now home again. The full story is:

I got home on Thursday evening at about 6:30. I had been in Christchurch for my farewell and handover. When I walked in both girls came to meet me as usual but when I got into the living room I found raisin packets on the floor. This sent me into an immediate panic as raisins can be lethal to dogs. A quick check revealed the pantry wide open. Brina was looking like she had eaten a lot so I tried to get her to vomit with some salt water. It didn't work so I got straight onto the vets. They said to bring her in. I threw both dogs in the car and flew down the motorway (at slightly illegal speeds) to the vets. By the time we got there Brina was looking really big so I was pretty sure bloat was now an issue too.

They took both dogs out the back to induce vomiting. Sammie obliged and managed to purge about 400g of raisins. She was then put on a drip and checked in. Brina retched a lot but couldn't vomit. They took x-rays to see if she had a twisted gut and then tried to pump her stomach. This was unsuccessful too, the only way to save her now was surgery.

My friend Kristina had come down to the Emergency Centre, she used to work there so offered to scrub in if a spare pair of hands would help.  They accepted.  So Brina went for her second life saving surgery in 6 months. I was very, very lucky as one of their top surgeons just happened to be there and he performed the operation. The operation went well. Afterwards the vet said that he was 'very impressed' at how much she had managed to eat. They scooped out about 4 litres of stuff: wrappers, sugar, coconut, raisins and lord knows what else. The vet said that she would have certainly died without the surgery.

She has been in hospital for the last 2 days and has been very depressed (we will blame it on the drugs). She is home now and looking very skinny and sad. She still is not eating but we are hoping that now she is home she will soon want to eat again *crossing fingers*.

On a completely different note, PROIR to both girls trying to kill themselves this week I had a fab time in Christchurch. I really like Christchurch and I really like my old team down there. We went out for dinner to Sticky Fingers and had a beautiful meal and lot of laughs. The team gave me a beautiful Pandora bracelet with a pony charm on it.

There were two reasonable earthquakes while was down there and I never felt a thing, I am quite disappointed by the quality of SI quakes. ;-)

After visiting Brina yesterday I went in to New Lynn to get a charm for my bracelet with the gift I got from Provisioning. I was able to get two charms so I got one that was kind of 4 leaf cloverish for Brina and a really cool silver one that will remind me of my time in Prov. I will post a photo when I am able.

Spyke is now back on holiday again for a short time. We were supposed to be show huntering on Saturday morning but Brina came first.

I start my new job tomorrow so have got my friend Tina coming in to look after Brina while I am at work. Hopefully it will just be a case of being here and syringe feeding her a couple of times a day.

Brina's Second Dice With Death

Brina is back in hospital after having life saving surgery....again. She got into the pantry this time and literally stuffed herself. The vet said he has never seen anything like it and that she is very, very lucky to be alive.

That's actually abotu all I can bring myslelf to say right now. I will update soon.

Some pics from this evening.

Slacker!!!!

Goodness I have been a slacker!!!! I hope everyone had a lovely Christmas and New Year.

I have been VERY busy in the last month. I will start right back where I finished off in my last entry. I have a new job. I am off to Gen-i (another part of Telecom) to be a Training and Development Manager (gulp). It is going to be a BIG challenge I think. Fortunately, with it comes a big pay rise which will come in very useful as my flatmate has moved on so I have no help with the rent any more. :-(

Spyke. Well Spyke and I have been kind of busy too. :-) We had our first 'proper' show hunter competition before Christmas. He was all plaited up and looking fabulous and I lost 3kg on a 2 week detox diet so that I could squeeze into my riding jacket. It was a really, really busy competition with heaps of horses there. We didn't really go so well. Actually, that's not true, I didn't go so well. Spyke jumped well (apart from slamming the anchors on at the second fence of the day and dropping me grrrrrr) but I was all OVER the place. The photos are down right embarrassing as me legs are all over the show, I got tipped forward over every jump and we ended up getting 2nd to last on the only round that counted, with 55%. It was pretty terrible and I felt very discouraged - BUT- I did wonder if my beloved Wintec was making life a bit harder so I borrowed Kristina's  CTD flat seat and we had our next attempt at Show Hunter a few days ago.

WHAT a difference!!!!! We got placed!!!! I felt completely different, I was able to balance and stay with him and found my jumping position again!! It was AMAZING!!!! That horse is born to Show Hunter, he is stunning!!!!? (He did manage to drop me TWICE this time though so that is something I am going to have to work on as I am not very keen on falling off.)  So now I have to buy a new saddle. :-/ I am going to need a proper jumping one. Thank goodness for finance. It gets a bit tricky when I am trying to get Brina's op sorted too but Spyke is 12 now and this is the best time to get him out there. I really believe that if I can get the stop sorted and get jumping a little bit bigger we have a shot at qualifying for Horse of the Year (not this year but maybe next).

Brina. She has been doing really, really well. She has loved me being on holiday (as have I :-) She got to be Santa's Reindeer at work just before Christmas. I took the wagon in and she pulled all the secret santa pressies around. She was a big hit and she was sooooooooooo good. I thought I would have to take her straight home after her 'performance' but she was perfectly happy to curl up under my desk and sleep.

On the down side, she has had two womping great seizures. :-( She had one just before Christmas that was just awful. She had about 3 seizures in a row with no break between, it was really, really scary. And early this morning she had another really big seizure. It was one where she didn't recognise me for about 5 minutes after she came around. She also put a hole in her lip. I really, really hate epilepsy!!!!!! She is Ok again this morning though, thank goodness but I find it really hard watching her go through these. The worst thing is that I would not be able to physically get her to the vet if I needed to. Another pitfall of being alone. :-(

BUT on to more positive things. I have just entered my next show hunter so I am looking forward to that. I go back to work on Monday. I have a week in my old job and then I am off to Telecom Place to start my new role. I have had a GREAT holiday We had Kerri and Walter come to stay, which was just lovely!!! And Anne and her family came to visit too. We spent lots of time up in the forest and the kids had a wee ride on Spyke (who was a STAR).

Oh just realised, I completely forgot to mention that the TV and master bedroom are now sporting a new coat of pain!!! Yay!!!! That was a BIG job but I got the TV room finished before Christmas (just) and got the bedroom done before new year. It is sooooo nice to have them done. The TV room looks completely different, I LOVE it!!!!

Anyway here are a few pics from the last month.

The new TV Room

 Our 2nd Show Hunter

 Brina at the office

Evie, Michael and the dogs

Kerri and Walter

 Our terrible SH