My diary for Maggie

An introductory note

Maggie is the latest four legged to join us. She has been with us for four months now. All the pictures here have been clicked once we were absolutely sure that she was going to make it.

2^nd April, 2016

I choose to begin with Maggie. I don’t know how this story will end, but I do not want to write about her in past tense.

Though she has been with us only for a few days, her story is remarkable already. First spotted by Broti on her way to work, we would see her later , only the next day. With a happy knack for spotting all kinds of hopeless cases, when Broti first alerted us to yet another four legged in need, we grimaced.  A young, adult female four legged was walking unsteadily, with her head supported by the skirting of the pavement. She said it was sick and needed help.

Baba, always ready to oblige his eldest, promised to come back and have a look. He did, later in the evening, least prepared for the sight that he was about to see. She was sitting on some rags. Her coat, white with brown patches; her age, about two plus; tall, dehydrated, skin and bones (though not the worst that one has seen), and her face- not there.  A gaping hole.  A familiar unpleasant odour for all those who have been involved in rescue missions… that of maggots.

Baba who is handed the most unenviable tasks a lot of times, flinched. He tried to give biscuits, hoping against hope. But there was no response. People around told him that the four legged was dead, but he could see the erratic rise and fall of the chest. He knew she was alive, didn’t know for how long. He was joined shortly by Broti on her way back from work and together they administered a few emergency medicines (which were thankfully made available by our emergency contact Nandini) and left her there under the care of some people. The plan was (our preferred vet not being in town that day) to take her to our vet first thing next morning and probably put her to sleep.

Three days now, she is with us, making a decent recovery. The maggots have left very little of her face. The vet says they had probably reached her brain. They are dead now.  Nothing is left of her eyes, and the nasal bone is completely visible. Not a sight for the faint hearted.

She now sits with an Elizabethan collar (homemade) round her neck, her face dressed with liberal dozes of medicine. She is eating and peeing and pooping- the three things that indicate hope for her. Less dehydrated now and safe from external influences (bad weather, bad people and other hostile dogs).  It’s a wonder she has made it alive this far. And no matter what happens now, at least she is not alone. She is not the only one fighting, we all are. And most of all, at least she is loved.

9^th April 2016

It has been just ten days now. Baba first started calling her Maggie…the hundreds of maggots on her face assisted with the christening. And the name stuck.

The positives are many. She is alive. She is recovering, eating normally and seems to be aware that she is someplace safe. Maggie is very trusting and extremely patient. She has to be given 10-12 shots everyday and her wound dressed every alternate day. She takes all her shots without fuss and is very cooperative when we dress her wound. Considering that she cannot see a thing, and the wounds are all in an extremely sensitive place, she allows the doctor to literally sweep the ointments under her skin on her head region where the skin is so loose that you can lift it off her skull neat and put your hand right in. The liquid ointments that are literally poured into her skull region come oozing out from where her eyes should have been.

The doctor says that she will never see again. We have never had a blind dog at home so we are also learning. She has been kept in the drawing room where the soft couch occupies most of the space so that she does not bump into any sharp objects.

Yesterday I let her out in the garden and got distracted for a while. I usually guide her out and then follow her around, but today, for a brief moment I was lost in my thoughts. When I next saw Maggie, she had walked into one of the Cycad plants and  hurt herself. I felt very guilty.

The first five days were critical, and this period is crucial. We do not know what kind of an impact the maggots may have had on her brain. She doesn’t seem to respond too well to her name and there is no way of knowing whether she can hear us at all or not. She walks into her plate of food and unless we hold the food completely under her nose, she misses it. One thing is for sure, she has a sweet tooth. She loves gobbling up sweet stuff though we can’t give them to her too much as it retards the healing process.  Talking of teeth, we are amazed to see the condition of her teeth. They are those of a very old dog. Her canines are broken and frayed and the rest of her teeth seem to have been filed so much that they are at gum level. Chutux, our oldest, has way better teeth.

I spend most of my day with Maggie and sleep on the couch in the same room at night, just in case she needs us. She gets up at two in the morning every day to go out. She nudges me with her nose to make her presence felt. She hasn’t barked even once yet.

12^th April, 2016

Today is a day of miracles. We have had a breakthrough! For the past few days I have been dressing up Maggie’s wounds without any assistance from the vet. On a whim, I decided to clean up a part of her scabs that were covering her eyes.  When the vet used to clean these regions he would say, “It’s coming through!”

His fingers would go through the pus and the all the ooze and seemed to go right through the eye socket! So, I wasn’t really feeling encouraged to remove the scabs, but then I thought, “Why not try?”

On clearing the scab over the left eye, a lot of pus and blood started oozing out. But after cleaning it all up, I couldn’t believe my eyes when I thought I could see a hint of an eyeball. I did not know whether it was my imagination or not, but she seemed to be oriented a shade better. This got me more curious and i called Broti to help me with the other eye. It was tougher as the dried blood, pus and hair had formed a stiff coating and it required a lot of patience and cajoling for us to work on it for quite some time. It was worth every bit! The moment the scab was lifted, Maggie first sniffed at our faces, then walked up to the ghastly Elizabethan collar and smelt it and one by one inspected all the ointments and medicines that were being used to clean her up. We could not believe what we were seeing! Broti then lay flat across the floor leaving very little room for anyone to pass in a gesture which betrayed relief mixed with bafflement. Maggie smartly walked up to where she lay, sniffed her eyes and used that narrow passage to move to the other part of the room. We knew. We had just witnessed a miracle. Maggie could see. If not completely, enough to get by.

She has never crashed into an object since.

Note: Maggie is now a cheerful dog who is full of the mischievousness that comes with young dogs. Maggie’s hazelnut coloured eyes speak volumes. She simply adores all of us and her high point of the day is greeting, when any one of us come from outside.  She has not yet been fully integrated with the other dogs, but efforts to do so are on. Her chewing abilities are amazing notwithstanding the condition of her teeth and she has beaten all others in the game of ‘Let’s see who finishes the bone first.’ She barks a lot now and sits on the couch on the sly when she thinks no one is watching! Her wound is by no means completely healed but she has made a recovery that none of us thought possible. She has at last got rid of the collar which she had begun to hate. Life is now a brighter, sunnier and happier.