Hard Week!
I haven't posted for a while...It has been a really difficult week. We had already lost one little girl and earlier last week, the smallest little boy wasn't doing well. I took him to the vet. All along, the vets have been telling us that "the puppies cannot aspirate mommy's milk". Well, evientially Leia has been producing too much milk (!) (didn't know that was possible) and he aspirated on it. BUT the doctor seemed to think that we caught it early, gave him some anitibiotics and he would be fine. (I have since found out from my breeder that once they aspirate, they almost never recover) I went to set up for a large homeschool conference in our town, and when I had come home, the little boy had died on Thursday, from pneumonia. Not only that, one of the little girls had gotten under the heat lamp and had gotten too hot. She was in the process of having a heat stroke. We have been able to revive her and she is still alive.
On top of that, our largest male was breathing hard. He was having problems with his oxygen level and was choking after his meals and turning purple. On Friday, my dh took him to the vet. He too had pneumonia. He fought SO hard. I honestly thought he would be gone by Saturday am, but he lived until 7:19 pm. We were so attatched to that little guy and he was sold (!) to a couple.
I was just so devastated. We have done everything we have been told to do and we are still loosing them. I never imagined that Leia could produce too much milk. All along the vets said, "They can never aspirate mommy's milk because they just absorb it". It wasn't until the largest male got sick and I called my breeder, in tears and a basket case. She said yes, it is possible for her to produce too much milk and she had it happen with a French bulldog.
So we started with 8, lost 2 at birth and now we have lost 3, including our 2 only males. We have gotten so attatched to these babies. Especially, since I am up, every three hours, making sure that they are okay and mommy is not rolling on them, squishing them and she licks them clean.
We now have three little girls left. Ironically, one of them is the runt, who is now up to 2 pounds. I am still worried about the smallest one, which we have nicknamed Padme, because she looks so much like her mommy (You have to be a Star Wars fan to understand). She is smaller but still eating.
I decided to take them in today at 4:15 to the vet that I prefer. I am going to let him look at them and make sure none of these have pneumonia and hopefully give us a clean bill of health.
On top of all this, I was scheduled to work the homeschool conference. My dh had said that he would schedule Friday off. He accidentally scheduled Training (!) last week. He ended up taking that day off, but I don't know if he will get credit for the class.
Then I got to my show. There is only supposed to be 1 Nest rep there. I have been doing this business for the last 6 years. I have never encountered another rep. When I went to set up, there was another company that is a subsidiary of our company, that goes door to door, but in their contract, they are PROHIBITED AND FORBIDDEN, from going to shows and or events. I don't know if it was college students that just didn't know better, or what. To make it worse, they were in the booth, right next to me! Well needless to say, my boss and the president of the company got involved and told them not to show up! So I was under stress about that, but PTL they didn't show up. But just the stress of having to deal with 7,000 people and worrying about the babies was tough. In retro-spect, it was probably good for the boys and I to get out of the house, for a break, but tough.
I knew there would be alot of work involved in these babies and raising them, but adding on having sick little ones and having to tube feed them, take their temps, etc, just added to it all. They are now two weeks old. Hopefully we can get past to the 3 week mark, and breathe easier. I know it has been hard on the mommy Leia. It was heartbreaking to see her lick her babies in the mouth continuously to try to revive them. She has been such a good first time mommy.
Anyway, just wanted to update why we haven't been blogging.
Southern Belle
UPDATE:I took the babies to the doctor yesterday. There are three girls left. We were concerned about the smallest one, that looks so much like her mommy. He xrayed her and said she too had pneumonia. We would be willing to do the oxygen tent, injectable antibiotics, IF there wasn't another problem, but there is. She has a flat/inverted chest. So, basically as her body grows and her organs grow, her chest won't. She would probably pass away at 3-4 months and is not adoptable. I just was in disbelief as to why we were loosing so many babies to pneumonia. I asked if her being in 26 hours of unsuccessful labor had anything to do with it. He said something that was new, and we hadn't heard before, BUT it makes SO much sense. It just frustrates me and if known early for treatment, we would potenitally have 5 babies instead of almost 2. He said that the babies had MECONIUM in their amniotic sacs! Another words, the babies had bowel movements in the sac and breathed it in! I asked again if they could aspirate on mommy's milk, and he said NO. Not unless she had a slight touch of mastitis, but that is not probable since she is on a strong antibiotic to prevent that! I am frustrated, but relieved to know that we know what is causing this terrible thing. We have been trying to prevent these other things, but I couldn't for the life of me figure out why they were getting pneumonia. And, nothing in my questions or research told me that it was possible for the babies to aspirate mom's milk.
