Puppy Trouble

Hey all. It's Raiser Erin. I'm afraid I have some bad news. As you all know Belle, Freya's birth mother, had another litter of puppies. This litter is an "E" litter. There's Epic (the only little yellow one), Eli, Eaton, Enrique, Estee, Esprit, and then there's Elmer. Elmer was recently assigned to an area near Fresno and I was looking forward to meeting him and most of the other puppies when they came through on the puppy truck today. Unfortunately I met all of Belle's puppy except Elmer (well, and the girls Estee and Esprit because they went to their puppy raising families about a week and a half ago). Unfortunately, Elmer has what is called a liver shunt. Before the puppies are born, the mother's liver takes care of the pups through this outside vessel. Then when the puppies are born this shuts down and the liver takes over. Elmer's didn't shut down and his liver never really took over. They sent him up to Davis to be evaluated and now he's back at Guide Dogs resting. He will be Career Changed. Supposedly this can be treated with a special diet, but only about half of the dogs who take this route survive. There is also an operation he can have and the difficulty of the operation depends on the type of shunt he has. If you could all please keep little Elmer in your thoughts that would be great.

I also have some bad news about Rocco. My poor little guy has had horrible diarrhea this morning and last night. We thought it had completely cleared up, but it didn't. He had diarrhea and he threw up a few days ago and we put him on a bland diet. The bland diet consists on 2/3 part white rice and 1/3 part cottage cheese. So since he's on 1 1/2 cups three times a day he would get 1/2 cup cottage cheese and 1 cup rice. Anyway, when we started to transition him off the cottage cheese and rice he started having a little diarrhea again. And last night he had it really bad. He seems a little better now, but I'm so worried about him. If you could keep him in your thoughts right behind Elmer that would be wonderful too.