Spencer & Sydney had their appointment with the vet this morning for their annual check-up and vaccines. We were also scheduled for a heartworm test on each of them since they weren't done last year. Let's just say, it didn't go well at all.







They scheduled us in with the new vet in the office but I figured I would give her a shot since my regular vet doesn't work on Saturdays and I would have had to take a day off work to take them. The new vet was really young, like just out of school but she was really nice and pretty good. I started off with Spencer because he is always more difficult. The exam goes relatively well, he wasn't a fan of having his temperature taken but didn't put up too much of a fuss. The vaccines went well, I have learned not to constrain him too much, just get him to eat a treat while doing them and he is pretty good. He did try to move a few times but we managed. Then it was time for the HW test and she needed to take some blood from his front leg. He got the tech to come in to help because he couldn't move at all for this one. They tried the first arm and it was a no go, he moved way too much and screeched as soon as the needle went in. We decided that we were going to have to really hold him for this one while she tried in the other arm. The tech and I were trying to hold him while the vet tried twice and still no luck, he was absolutely terrified. The vet decided that the only way we would be able to do this would be to sedate him because he was way too stressed out and we couldn't just keep poking him. We let him calm down a bit while we went ahead and did Sydney. She is such a trooper, I swear she put her paw out for them to take the blood from her, she is such a good girl!! Then, it was time to sedate Spencer which was a needle in the muscle. Again, the tech and I had to hold him and when that needle went in, he FREAKED. He was screeching so loud it was like a human was screaming. I was almost in tears. We went back out to the waiting room for about 15 minutes while it kicked in. He was knocked right out, his tongue was hanging out and everything. I just sat there holding him until we went back in (I did take a couple pictures with my phone though [img]images/smilies/icon_smile.gif[/img] ). We went in and I swear, he was being poked like he was a pin cushion. There was no blood anywhere. They tried the front legs again and nothing, she said that the veins were blown. We then went to the back legs and he was giving like a drop at a time. Finally after about 4 times of just getting a bit, we managed to get enough to do the test (1mL). They then gave him the needle to reverse it all and he quickly came out of it but man, an hour and a half later and we were finally getting out of there. There were so many people in the waiting room because they were now very behind schedule.







So, the next time we have to do this, I am going to book in with my original vet, the last time Spencer put up a fuss as well but we managed to get it done without having to sedate him. I hate doing that to him, he was pretty sleepy all day even though they gave him the shot to reverse it. So ya, what should have been just a routine checkup turned into a big ordeal.