Why I Love My Job

Good Afternoon

Alright, I have been meaning to get to this post for the longest time! Its a blog about my job, and I've been told I should write about it more. So here is the first one, Ill try to write about my work more often. 

I am going to start with a successful happy ending story :) This little guy needed to have a surgery for a foreign body removal. He ate some carpet. Once we got inside we found that the carpet was strung and coiled from the stomach to the large intestine and was created an accordion appearance to the intestines (not good). A large portion of the intestines were necrotic/dead and had to be removed. That is the dangerous part as recovery can go both ways.

Sadly, this little guys recovery didn't go so well. He was in surgery for about 4 hours which is really long in the animal world, not sure about human standards? There was so much carpet fibres and damaged intestines that it took forever. The longer the pet is under anaesthetic the harder the recovery. After surgery he was extremely painful and the Drs couldn't seem to find a protocol that helped, they believed he was in "wind up" which basically means before pain mediation was started his body reached pain threshold and can't come back down. Its sort of confusing but had to do with synapses firing in the body constantly like a skipping record but thats all confusing physiology.  Point behind, he was very painful and it took forever to get him feeling better.

Poor guy was so uncomfortable for his first 2 days out of surgery he couldn't sleep. I gave him this pillow to help get his belly off the cage. You could see him fighting sleep as his head would fall and his eyes would shut but a second later he would jolt awake. After introducing the pillow he actually fell asleep! After he got some sleep, and started producing good amounts of urine (we had to urinary catheterize as he could not get up to use the washroom) we tried to get him to eat to see how his intestines were doing. Of course, he wanted nothing to do with his food. I don't blame him. At this point its been 3 days post op and we need to get some nutrition into his system or he will never heal.

First we placed a large naso-gastric tube into his stomach to decompress all the air he has swallowed from panting so aggressively (in pain) in the past few days. This was very beneficial, as soon as we did that he breathing normalized. Then we placed a more permanent naso tube that we will be using to feed him. Thats the green one coming from his nose. We started giving him some liquid diet but he would just regurg. 30 minutes later. Things did not look so well for him.

Then the miracle happened. RANDOMLY, in the middle of the night, I put down some fresh food in the cage just in case and he gobbled it down! I was so proud of the little guy! Such a giant step in the right direction. I think the best thing a tech can do is get a sick patient to eat. He still regurged a little bit after each meal but the fact that he ate on his own is enough.

Two days later he went home to his family with his tube still in place in case he stopped eating. Everyone was so shocked and pleased to see that he made it through as there was multiple times were things didn't look good for him. Not too long ago, the owners called in to have his stomach staples removed and I couldn't believe how happy and energetic the little guy was! Success stories like this is why I love my job.

Sample of the carpet, we like to keep pieces to show the owner what we find, especially if they are unsure what the dog ate. Thats the fun part!

I feel like I threw a lot of information out there at once, and sort of like my thoughts were all over the place but I didn't want to miss anything.  Thanks to the great owners who didn't give up! 

D

4 Great Recipes

I have been saving up these photo's for a couple weeks. These are four homemade recipes we have put together.

Slow cooked beef, potatoes and carrots

This needs a better more creative name, what do you call this sort of meal? This recipe was super easy and I loved it because I got to use my crock pot. We just chopped up some stewing beef, potatoes, onions, and carrots and put them in the pot covering with water. Anthony added some spices while it was cooking, I am not positive what he used but I think he used vegetable seasoning, and steak spice. After four hours of cooking on high I drained the water from the pot, but reserved 1 cup of liquid to make gravy. I just used packaged powder gravy but instead of adding plain water, I added the 1 cup of broth from the crock pot. It turned out great. This meal was amazing. Closest thing to a "home cooked" meal for me. Felt just like something my mom would make. 

Dorito Taco Salad

This one was my favourite of course. I love food of this genre. Taco, burrito, quesedilla, etc. I guess it falls under Mexican food. Doesn't hurt that I made it with Doritos which are to die for! So again, this is really easy. All my recipes are easy because I am a beginner cook and need easy directions to cook by myself. sometimes I am still asking my mom questions/tips. So I browned 2lb of ground beef and drained all the fat. Then added a package of taco seasoning and 1/2 cup water, simmer for 10 minutes. In the meantime, prepare all toppings. I used typical lettuce, tomato and cheese. I don't have set quantities, as I really just used what I had left in the fridge so nothing would go bad. I filled a decent sized bowl so just crushed some Doritos to equally fit the bowl. Once meat is done, stir all ingredients together. I topped mine off with some salsa and sour cream. So good :) 

 Anthony's homemade burgers

Now... I don't have the secret recipe to his burgers, but I know it involved a bunch of different seasonings and spices, as I've seen him prepare this but I don't know which ones. He also uses bread crumbs when making his burgers. I just thought they looked so colourful and perfect I needed to share them. Burgers are 

generally pretty easy to make so I am sure you don't need a recipe. How do you like your burgers?

 Cheesy Mushroom Chicken & Pasta

This meal was fun to create. We had a bunch of ingredients in the fridge that were very close to expiring so we pulled them all out and created something. We had chicken, mushrooms, and pasta sauce that really needed to be used up. So obviously enough, I made some quick pasta with sauce and left Anthony to deal with the rest. He came up with this. A chicken breast with cheez whiz and mushrooms in the middle. OMG this was so good. The cheez whiz baked comes out so creamy and the mushrooms give a good boost of flavor. For a meal that was thrown together with expiring foods, I'd say it turned out pretty awesome. 

D

Valentines Date Night

Good Evening! 

We have just returned from our late dinner in celebration of Valentines day. As promised I will show you my outfit of the night, and our meals. 

We went to Montana's cookhouse. I ordered the Cookhouse meatloaf that came with mashed garlic potatoes and gravy with some veggies. Anthony ordered the Chipotle Firecracker burger with a Caesar salad. 

 mine

Anthony's

I ordered a Big Mama's Late Afternoon Lemonade, and Anthony got an over sized beer. My drink was amazing! I got a copy of the recipe, I plan to remake it in the summer and am going to get the cute mason jar glasses to boot. Anthony's beer was massive, and cannot believe it was only $8.99.

The meals were delicious, as always. And very well priced!

Below is my outfit of the night. I had originally planned to wear a cream lace, and black peplum dress but it was freezing tonight and started snowing, so I went with a Valentines Day themed outfit with pants instead. Its probably better that I did because the restaurant we went to is a cookhouse, so I might have been a bit overdressed.

I went with a pair of red skinny jeans for occasion. A white frilly top, and white skinny belt. And of course some sky high black strap heels.  I am wearing my rose gold watch, and had planned on wearing a statement necklace in rose gold as well but me and Anthony agreed it was too much with the frilly shirt. Instead I wore some gold and black earrings that were a gift from Anthony's Nana. My nails are painted red and white as well but can't tell in the image.

 earrings

curls

I used my curling wand again tonight to style my hair, and the more I use it the more I love it. The bottom picture I took after dinner and you can see my curls are starting to fall and I love it!!! I'm going to do my hair 2-3 hours before going out just so that the curls fall because it gives bigger soft curls. 

How was your Valentines Day ?

D