More dog. Sorry if you are bored....but it's the only thing I got goin' on in my life right now though! And it's all encompassing!
(although I am still watching Le Tour and knitting)

Well, we went back to the vet today.

She wasn't worried one bit about the stabilizing stitches that had come untied (thank god, because two more had come undone over night--sheesh!!). In fact, she thought the incision line looked so well healed that she removed the whole stabilizing system and the laces. She also removed the drains.

But. As I suspected, infection had indeed begun to set back in.

For once though, something went right in this whole fiasco. The results of culture had made it back to the vets office this morning before my appointment. If you recall, the vet had taken a sample of the goop Riley was leaking during that last surgery on Saturday. Lo and behold, it turns out poor Riley has 3 very different nasty things growing in there (with names so foreign to me, I couldn't repeat them if I tried). The broad spectrum antibiotics he's been on for the last 5 days have been a bit helpful, but they were not as specifically targeted as they could have been. The doc is super pleased to know exactly what she is throwing darts at now, as she put it.

Sooooo.....behold, the new pharmaceutical cocktail:


Three antibiotics, and an anti-inflammatory/pain med.

Another 5 days of hot compresses, another 9 days of pain meds, and another 2 weeks of restricting his mobility, plus wearing the cone of shame, plus keeping the stitches in along the suture line. 30 days of the new antibiotics. And 6 more weeks of feeding pureed food due to the broken jaw.

And a partridge in a pear tree ;-)