Friday, August 5, 2011

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What JLo and Jam Have in Common

We've been having a problem with Jam vomiting in the middle of the night. What seemed to work was a crate snack: a snack given just before bedtime. But right before we went in for our flu booster shot, Jam vomited again and he threw up all of the crate snack, mostly whole and undigested. At 2 am.

The vet put him on Pepcid AC twice a day and said to continue the crate snacks. That was Tuesday. That evening at obedience Judy, our AC, told us that perhaps another part of the problem was that Jam was eating too fast and not digesting his food. She recommended that we get some slow feeder bowls or put big rocks (or something he couldn't fit in his mouth and wasn't a toy) in his current bowl that he would have to eat around and would slow him down.



We had already changed to make him eat with Willow so that he would know not to charge her bowl after he was done with his. We had started feeding them separately, but realized it was better that they eat together. Just for fun, we got them each a JW skid stop slow feed bowl.


Jam usually finishes his meal in about 45 seconds. The first time we fed him with the new bowl it took him 4 MINUTES to finish his lunch!

Here he is waiting for us to put down the food in his new bowl.

I've been thinking a lot about Jam and his eating fast and being a service dog and being under such intense scrutiny. It's sort of like having the paparazzi always around. Just waiting for that unflattering photo to appear. Take the one above for instance. He's a little pear-shaped isn't he? We might even be talking about the beginnings of a booty.

Now, he hasn't jumped into JLo territory.


As you can see, poor JLo was caught showing some perfectly normal cellulite on her legs and the photo shows a substantial booty. Jam is quite a distance from a JLo booty and his fuzziness (as shown below) would certainly hide any unfortunately dimples.

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But he is under pressure to perform. Just like JLo. Does he feel the pressure? Is that part of his problem? At night when I hand feed him to get him to eat slowly, he sits very patiently and waits for each bite. He watches to see if my hand will go back up for more food, but he doesn't ever whine or act anxious or greedy.



But when he sleeps he lets it all hang out.



JLo wouldn't do that.

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