Vinny's out of surgery

The vet at AEC just called to say Vinny's surgery went well. She said it was one of the most difficult fractures she's tried to put together, but in the end she's happy how it turned out. She put many pins into his leg, I'm not even sure how many yet. He'll have pins removed and reinserted over the next few months to insure that his limb is able to grow, but it might still have some impediment. He'll also be highly medicated over the next few months with NO activity. My heart breaks over that. O, how he loves to chase us around, go up and down the stairs and play his "bad dog" game where he'd grab something he wasn't supposed to have as if to say "I'm a bad dog, I'm a bad dog come and get me". He had JUST learned to play fetch too, he was so fast and frisky and daring for a 3 month old puppy. He practically hopped like a rabbit. I can only believe that his spirt and sassiness will help home come back to full recovery. I can see him in my minds eye standing on his hind legs trying to jump up to sniff for treats when we were eating on the couch. He loves cheerios. Just yesterday morning he came with us to our church to send our oldest off to camp. He was sad that he wasn't going to get to go in the van with all the boys. Ugh, it's hard also because my 16 year old son will come home to see Vinny on bed rest and I know it will break his heart. He's such an animal lover. When we were in Kentucky two weeks ago he saw a dog he thought was a stray and he wanted to take her home so badly. He kept asking us why anyone would let a dog wander around the streets. The dog had stitches as it turned out and we were told it was a neighbors dog down the road and it had been recently fixed; he was upset that she wasn't being pampered and he thought kidnapping her should be considered. :o) It hurts me to think of my little Piglet confined to a crate for so long, but it's such a short time compared to a full healthy life. He might even be able to come home tomorrow. This means no car trips of course, so good-bye to our idea of Adventures of Vinny the Pooh for awhile (We mapped out of the places he's already been.) I can't tell you how much it means to me to know so many are thinking of Vinny or praying. Even if you can't donate, and I understand as we're in a very tight spot ourselves, your positive thoughts and suggestions of options are very accepted. One suggestion from my dear friend, Kathy, a nurse, was to see if we have a veterinary school in our area for less expensive care. Of course, if the healing process goes terribly wrong and we can't gather enough donations, we'd have to let someone else from a rescue center take him, but I have hope it won't come to that. And I don't think it will. Today I saw the worst and best in people. One man, who has no idea what he's talking about, added insult to injury by suggesting somehow that I'm reckless or careless and my own kids are mean or cruel. It's anything but that. Even if that neighbor boy had accidentally dropped him if Vinny tried to jump (and he did try to jump right out of your arms sometimes, which is why we didn't let kids pick him up and our own kids were very cautious) , it was ACCIDENTAL. I had just sat down. Accidents DO happen. Any person should know that, especially a parent whether of a child or a four-legged baby. I can remember when I fell down the stairs with one of my babies, I had just slipped, I did nothing wrong. Thank God I was able to take the whole fall and everything was OK, but I felt so terrible, even when logically I knew I had done nothing wrong. For a full day I have been so upset with myself, even though I know bad things happen. Why did I let some kids in, when I never do? I thought I'd be supermom and let my son have a friend in when he rarely gets to. Would that have changed things? Maybe the extra kids were an accident waiting to happen. Or maybe not. He could have just have easily leapt from my own arms as he's tried before. Or perhaps the little guy could have gotten under my foot like he'd do and I could have stepped on him? You just never know, things go wrong. I think to myself, gosh, Melissa, you should have just turned around a moment sooner or had taken him potty before his time. In the end, I know I take good care of him and I can't beat myself up over it. I'm tortured with the what if's all on my own with "mother's guilt", so I don't need mean people trying to smear me and make us seem like horrible people and insulting my kids. Like I said though, I knew I might get some criticism, but I thought more in line with people not sure about our accepting donations, I never knew someone would be so mean and slanderous. I certainly am not a neglectful parent nor would I neglect my precious Vin Vin. Then I was reminded of good people in the world. Even when our pocket books can't spare any change, we can still reach out to others in kindness or mercy. We can share suggestions, kind words; a smile. We can share our own stories or talents. Today another angel came into Vinny's life. Her name is Ali, and she's brought me much encouragment. I'm not one to flatter but I have to say she's one of the sweetest people I've *never* met. :o) She's helped to give me some hope today and restore my faith that there's good and giving people. She's going to give Vinny's blog a newer handsome look and I'm excited about sharing pictures of him and seeing what she comes up with. Her design site is full of fantastic blogs she's done and I know many of my friends have looked around for blogger templates, so I hope you bookmark her site for when your looking for a new look on her blog. You can see Ali's designs at Alley Cat Web Design. Our family appreciates her donating services and helping to get the word out. She'll probably get tired of me "praising" her, but today, she was truly a godsend to me. To have things go so badly in the blink of an eye just is shocking to us, literally we've been a bit of a wreck in this last day, little sleeping, little eating, and today through her kind words I was given some peace and I truly felt like she might be part angel. All of my friends have been great, I thank all of you. My dear friend and Vinny's prior mama just feels awful too. Vinny came from the home of two of our best friends and without her support and suggestions I'd be a bit clueless. To the mean person who keeps trying to send comments about how irresponsible we are, accidents happen. She too had a dog that broke its leg shortly after a move to a new house. It wasn't anywhere near as bad as Vinny's, but she turned her attention away for a brief time and he landed wrong into a hole in the ground and broke his leg. He was 8 or 9 years though. Her lastest Boston Terrier was always trying to leap off their very high bed and she'd be worried like I was about Vinny, but so far she's been fine. Her Bostons leap and jump everywhere. A few weeks ago her Holly Bear jumped onto someone else's lap to get to mine. I had mentioned to her many times that he loved to jump quite a bit and I'd get worried that he might stumble in a land. He learned to jump off the bed or couch at 9 weeks, he loved it. I was sure he'd be learning to jump up onto to the couch soon. I'll never look at jumping the same. It only takes a second for everything to change though, but I think most of us know this. Sigh. This has been a long day. I still can't believe this has happened to the poor little guy. I can't even wrap my mind around it yet. We are so thankful though for our friends, family, and for all you animal lovers that are reaching out to us. Even the tiniest donation helps and of course, your thoughts, prayers, and suggestions are encouraging. This will be a long road for Vinny, but our family wouldn't be the same now without him.