First Day...

So it was a pretty rough first night with Amos in his new home. Getting him out of the back of our SUV and into the house when we got home from Vegas was an ordeal as he was still pretty loopy from the sedatives they gave him at LVVRC before we left. He was pretty restless in the car so I'm sure he didn't sleep much on the way home so when he got out of the car he didn't really want to walk at all. We had an x-pen set up for him in our living room with a soft bed and blanket and tried to get him to walk to it, but he wasn't having it, so we ended up carrying him to it and laying him down (boy is he a B I G boy). We fed him and gave him his meds and some water and then he crashed to sleep. Dr. Geels at LVVRC instructed us to give him an Acepromazine (sedative) for the first few nights to help him sleep and to keep him less restless while we sleep and can't keep an eye on him. I made the mistake of giving it to him at around 7:30pm last night instead of right before we went to bed (they work pretty quickly). When it came time to go to bed, we tried to get him to move to go outside and go potty but he was completely out of it. Partly from the drugs and partly because I'm sure he was exhausted from the trip. We got him as far as the kitchen when he couldn't hold his bladder anymore and let it go. Poor boy. After we got him cleaned up we got him situated in the pen in our bedroom (so he could be closer to us) and settled in for the night. Because I gave him the sedative so early that meant he was up rather earlier too. I woke up to him whining in his pen about 3:30am this morning. After some consoling that we were still there he finally went back to sleep. When we finally got up for the morning he was ready to walk himself outside (with our help of course) and go potty. We got him fed and cleaned up and back in his pen for the day. Whew. He was full, happy and ready for some more rest to help his hip get better... Not too bad for the first night.

He fared better during the day today, but he has a bit of diarrhea today. We are keeping his fluids up since we think it might be the cocktail of medicines that he is on, or the nerves of being in a strange house with people he doesn't really know yet. His stool was a bit more firm this evening so that is good. He is starting to get the light back in his eyes this evening and I think he is settling in to a routine. He is having a bit of a separation anxiety issue whenever Rick or I leave the area where his pen is. Hopefully this will not be a long term problem, as we don't want him hurting himself while we are at work. We'll have to wait and see. More tomorrow...