Georgia, Part II

There wasn't supposed to be a second installment of this narrative.
Our "Georgia-Peach" came home from the vet's and everything seemed okay. She was keeping her food--what little we were supposed to be feeding her--down, always a good thing, and her personality was returning. If anything, she was a bit dopey and lethargic, but nothing too out of the ordinary.

Eva was chatting on the phone last night when Georgia suddenly gave out a piercing scream, jumped two feet straight up in the air, and came down snapping at her own heel. What the hell was that?, I thought to myself. Did she step on her?
Our puppy looked around, seeming to come out of some sort of trance, and darted behind her Mommy, where she cowered.
No cats up here...nothing to explain why she'd suddenly--
Just then, she did it again.
She landed splay-footed this time, wailing. Tux went over to sniff her, anxiously. I approached cautiously, I petted her head, murmuring the kinds of things you say to your kids to calm them down, while I tried to calm down myself.
She accepted the petting, and I examined her. No obvious sore spots, but she's...well, not exactly panting, but out of breath, anyway, and she's making retching noises. Nothing's coming out, just an ominous huk! huk!
Then she tore off around the living room as if all the bats of hell were on her ass, ending up, once again, cowering behind Eva.
That's not normal canine behaviour, I thought to myself, conjuring all sorts of awful explanations like tumours and infections and imminent death.
These...episodes...continued, alternating with periods where Georgia laid perfectly quiet, quivering a little, an occasional huk! the only thing to let us know she was still with us. With no warning at all, she'd suddenly snap her head up and bark piteously, shaking.
Eva and I looked at each other.
"That's not right", I said. She nodded.
"We ought to take her to the vet."
A little more conversation on that point, a call to the after-hours clinic, who assured us we weren't overreacting, and it was decided.
I had to go to work, right then--didn't want to, let me tell you--and we really didn't want to leave Tux at home by himself. The humans in the house weren't the only ones worried.

Auntie Suzie, thankfully, agreed to take Tux in for a bit, and we all piled into the car. Of course, by now, Georgia seemed pretty much fine. Isn't that the way? It's like when you take your clunker of a car in to the mechanic and it runs like a dream.
I was dropped at work, Tux was dropped at his favourite aunt's place, and Georgia was ferried all the way to Cambridge. Ninety minutes later, Eva called.

"She's okay", she said.

Apparently there had been a noticeable change in Georgia just while she was being examined.

"The vet thinks it might be psychological, stress-related."

Great. We have a crazy dog. MAD DOG ON THE LOOSE!

Then again, with the week she's had--taken away from Mommy/Daddy/big brother, knocked out, hysterectomized, revived all alone, brought home, subjected to fits of voluminous vomiting, face puffed up like a balloon...well, I'd go a little nuts, too.

"This vet doesn't have psychological background. Ours does. So when we bring our chlluns in next week, we'll chat a bit. But the clinic vet here did ask if Georgia had taken to chasing her tail obsessively, lately."

"W-e-ll, I wouldn't say obsessively..."

"I asked her to define obsessively. She said more than once a week. Our wee girl qualifies, don't you think?"

"I think." I was thinking of all the times I'd reached out to give her tail a friendly little yank, only to find it coated in dogslobber.

Sure enough, our peach has been just fine today. She slept with me all day, glommed to my side like she used to do when I slept at night like a normal human being. No sign of hallucinations, no vomit lagoons, and a dog who's playing-with-the-Tux as if nothing whatever happened last night.

Tux and Georgia, together again

I hope she's okay for real and for good, now.