Life without Murphy was miserable, but life with Murphy the cone head has been interesting. Wayne and I have had to make some adjustments to our lifestyle to accommodate Murph’s new one.
Confining Murphy the Cone Head
Because Murph is on super limited activity restrictions, the vet suggested we keep him confined in a bathroom or crate.
The times I’ve had to lock him behind the laundry room door (like when we had tornado threats earlier this year), he’s gone bonkers jumping and scratching to be let out. That wasn’t going to work.
And he’s not too fond of crates. (Like when we had to put him in one at Dollywood until a regular “cell” came open. He was not happy with us. He pitched a major fit.) I didn’t really want to traumatize him with crating him. He doesn’t need the insult on top of the injury!
But I needed some kind of containment system. I opted for a “pet playpen” to confine him in our living room. So far that’s working pretty good.
Comforting Murphy the Cone Head
Because his playpen’s not covered, and since he’d likely be able to scale it under normal conditions, we weren’t sure it’d hold him. If he tried to scale it in his current condition, it could have disastrous results.
Friday night he didn’t understand why we were going upstairs to sleep without him. There wasn’t any breakout attempts, but there was a lot of crying and fussing and me running downstairs every half an hour to an hour to quiet him down again. Wayne finally ended up going down to sleep on the couch with him.
Saturday was my turn at couch duty. (We didn’t even bother trying to have both of us sleep upstairs.) Sunday Wayne took his turn camping out with Murph again. Last night was our first night giving Murph a chance to sleep alone. He did fine. (But he’s had three full days now of understanding the living room’s his spot –day and night.)
Making Exceptions for Murphy the Cone Head
There are two things we’ve made exceptions for to make Murph’s life easier.
1. His Elizabethan collar is supposed to stay on at all times. We take it off when we take him outside. We allow this because (a) he’s on a leash and we’re supervising him the whole time so he has no chance of getting at his stitches, and (b) we quickly realized it seems to slow down his “dooty” doing to have it on.
2. Because the pet playpen unfolds and can be used as a gate, we rig it up to give him a bit more space in the living room. (We decided to do this because once he’s laying down he stays down.) This seems to help him sleep and not whine during the nights, and also gives me peace of mind when I’m running errands that he’s not trying to scale out of his pen.
