Well, in early January, Tate was roughhousing in the snow with his BFF, Loretta. Nothing unusual but that night he woke up crying and couldn’t put weight on his left hind leg. The next morning, Dad took him to the Vet Emergency Center, where they said it was either an injury or maybe hip dysplasia. They gave an rx for Rimadyl and said to come back for x-rays and surgery if it wasn’t better in a few days.
In a couple days it was better, he didn’t need the Rimadyl and was fine. But about a month later, we took him to the park and noticed him favoring the same leg but no other signs of anything wrong. This was right after the huge snowstorm that just about everyone in the whole country had so we thought he just irritated the original injury playing in the deep snow. Took him to the vet as soon as we could get in. That’s when things went south.
X-rays showed lesions on the bones in his hip joint. That was about 3 weeks ago, and everything since then is a blur of tests and second opinions and research and figuring out how to get Tramadol into him. Poor Tater-Tot.