My Dog And A Tampon

Last night my dog (a five pound malteese) committed the ultimate of gross "no nos!"

At 10:45pm I got in the shower after doing my belly dance workout. Normally I put my dog, Muffet in her kennel for the night before I get in the shower, but for some reason, I forgot until I saw her standing in bathroom doorway. I thought as I closed the bathroom door that I would just shower and then put her in the kennel.

As I was washing my hair, I heard a thud. I looked around the shower curtain, but I did not see anything because I am as blind as a bat without my glasses. Everything looked like a blurry normal. So I finished my shower, dried my hair with a towel and put my glasses on. That is when I noticed some trash from the trash can was laying beside the toilet and the bathroom door was open about an inch.

Muffet has been known to get into the bathroom trash in the past and normally I call for her, she comes running, I tell not "no!" and she runs for her little bed under the shelf with her tail between her legs and I clean up the mess. But this time I called her from the bathroom door and she peeked her head around the corner, then slicked around the corner with her head down and darted under my desk to hide. All of sudden I realized what she had done! She had gotten a tampon out of the trash can and ate part of it! Yuck!

With this realization, I remembered a friend of the family telling me at one time that her neighbors had a Shih Tzu named Taipei, who got into the trash and ate a couple tampons. The owner had to take the dog in for emergency surgery to remove the tampons because they had expanded in the dog's digestive tract and could kill the dog. The surgery cost quite a bit and the dog was jokingly called "Tampon" instead of Taipei around the neighborhood.

I had no idea what to do, Muffet was not yet acting sick, not that I could tell. When she saw that I had found the tampon in the living room, she b-lined it for he kennel where she thought she might be safe. She knew that she was in a mountain of trouble.

I thought I might wait it out, so I closed and locked the front of her kennel, so she could not get out and get into more trouble. I grabbed my PDA and sat on my couch (it is actually a padded bench and not very comfortable)to read for a little bit while waiting to see if Muffet gets sick. I then thought that I should call the vet and see if they had a vet on call during the night. East Lohman Veterinary Clinic's answering service picked up, which meant that they did did not have an on call vet, but I asked the operator if she knew of an on call vet in town. She did and gave me the number.

I called the Emergency Animal Clinic and spoke with the on call vet. She said that her Jack Russell Terrier does that all the time and the reactions can very from dog to dog. She said I should only really be concerned if Muffet swallowed the tampon whole. But she told me to keep an eye on her, because some dogs can get upset stomachs and if the conditions persists, take to the vet, but she should be fine.

I listen for Muffet to get sick for most of the night, but it never happened, thank goodness. Needless to say though, Muffet is now banned from ever entering the bathroom again, except for when she needs a B.A.T.H, which then, she does not want to be in the bathroom.