Stubborn Tobi.

My little 'fro monster is clearly feeling better. She hates being cooped up, whimpers and cries when she's left in her crate long enough for me to make my own dinner (she either has to be crated, held, or right next to one of us on the couch as long as we can quickly grab her if she tries to jump), and now she has started refusing to take her medicine.

We had been putting a little bit of peanut butter on one of her tiny treats before hiding a pill in the middle of it so we'd have less of a battle when it came time for her to take her meds--three times/day. And then she decided to get picky with the peanut butter. No longer could I pre-make all of the treats for the day in an effort to save time. She had to have just the right consistency with the peanut butter & it couldn't be remotely stale. If it wasn't to her liking, she'd simply open her mouth and let the treat fall out onto the floor. And then she'd just look at me with a "You failed. Try again." attitude. It reminds me of Goldie Hawn in "Overboard", when her butler, Andrew, serves her caviar that is not up to par. Put some golden tresses on Tobi and you've pretty much got the same scene. So, we made sure she had fresh peanut butter & that was going well.

I'm not quite sure what happened, but pretty soon that extra effort wasn't even good enough for her. She got to where she won't let even the freshest peanut butter pass her lips. So, rather than adding a foreign food (like cheese--in which pills can easily be pushed) to her diet & dealing with any ramifications from that, I instead decided to just give her the pill on its own. It's actually not a full pill--it's 1/4 of a pill that is just larger than a Tic Tac to begin with. So, it's a very small bit she had to be fed. You'd think it would be a relatively easy task. Not with Tobi.

Yesterday morning I thought I'd make the whole experience of me essentially shoving my finger down her throat a lot more fun by singing to her about how she needs to swallow her pill without spitting it out. I then thought that doing so operatically may be that much-needed extra special touch that would make her think, much like Lindsay Lohan must, "Oh, taking pills is fun! I can do this!" But, instead, it was met with Artis shouting from upstairs, "Is Tobi whining and screaming again?? What happened to her??" (She initially screamed a lot when she first came home. You'd just look at her wrong and she'd scream. Thankfully, we got past that.) I said, "No, she's not screaming. I was singing to her operatically about how she needs to swallow her pills without spitting them out." I almost added "Jerk." to that, but because I'm Kind Kade I held back. (My response to him was met with, "Oh. Oops." Yes oops, Artis. My singing--even when operatic and with medicine as the subject--cannot be compared to that scream Tobi emits from the depth of her being. Nothing on this earth can compare to that scream. She puts infants to shame with her vocal abilities.)

It only took two or three stanzas/tries before I got her to take the pill. It was relative success...but briefly lived. Last night, it took five times when I first got home before she'd not hide it somewhere under her tongue and spit it out as soon as I let her open her mouth. What's worse is that she spits it into her bushy beard, so I have to work at getting a soggy, disintegrating tiny pill out of this mayhemic hair. It's not an easy task--especially because she gets wiggling about and there are only so many ways to hold on to her right now. Last night's bedtime pill time was the worst yet; this morning wasn't a walk in the park either. So, I'm just glad that Artis takes care of the afternoon dose today--and that we only have four more days of pills to deal with anyway.

Meanwhile, I get to continue prying her mouth open, while trying to avoid her crazy razor sharp fangs as I shove a little speck of a pill down her throat. It'd be so much easier if she'd just go back to loving Jif. Maybe she prefers chunky...