let’s talk about bentley

On Tuesday morning, Mr PugRunner took our youngest pug, Bentley, to the vet to be sedated and have the lump on his face investigated.

Bentley is a bit of a tricky dog. While most pugs are content to snuggle and do their best impression of bearskin rugs, Bentley is a bit… high strung. He hates snuggling and loves running. He’s like the anti-pug.

Of course, three out of three pugs agree that mealtimes are the best times, so they have that in common.

He’s very smart, very food-motivated, and very affected by the poor treatment from his previous owners. He’s come a long way with us, but I don’t know that he’ll ever recover entirely from that. It breaks my heart for him, but we are giving him a safe, secure, loving environment with plenty of food, the run of a big yard, and all the treats he can eat.

He’s always been incredibly healthy and hardy, unlike our other two special snowflakes. Which is why we really weren’t expecting him to be subjected to a “procedure.”

And he had a rough day of it. He was completely out and the vet went ahead and removed the entire lump. He saw something he didn’t like and erred on the side of caution. I will spare you the photos of the sample that Mr PugRunner felt necessary to text to me, but let’s just say it was pretty awful. The wound was stitched from the inside, and doesn’t look too bad on his muzzle, so it should heal cleanly. The sample was sent off to the lab, so we will have results in a few days. Hopefully, it’s nothing and if it is something, hopefully it was caught early and eradicated.

While he was under, the vet also removed several teeth that were loose, with the start of an abcess. Bentley is a notorious rock and ice eater, so I have no doubt that was the root of his problem. I’m not sure how we’re going to break him of the habit. Nothing makes him happier than crunching on a ice cubes in the back yard, but I guess we’ll see what he can do with several less teeth and go from there.

We were so happy to have him home, even Molly who usually barely tolerates his presence.

He will be on crate-rest for the next two days. The weather promises to be rainy, so maybe he won’t mind. He was treated to some steak when he got home and I had to freeze a cup of water for him because he won’t drink water from the bowl and he lacks the restraint to lick an ice cube in someone’s hand. He’ll just grab it and run. The vet promised that if he leaves his muzzle alone, he won’t have to wear the dreaded cone of shame, so fingers crossed that he behaves.

We all appreciate the good thoughts. It’s hard when our little guys are hurting.

In the meantime, training continues. We are expecting a big cold front on Thursday, so I’m curious to see how this will affect my overall performance. Now that Bentley is settled, I’ll be able to focus more on my running.

If you have pets, what have they done to make you laugh, lately?