The Yak “Bone” Saga

I like the dried cheese yak dog bones that are hard, but splinter, so they are not as rigid as other choices one could make. And they are fully edible. AC Slater LOVED them.

Jackpot has a whole bunch of puppy teeth—especially the big canines—that are now being replaced by big boy teeth. So the other day I got one of the yak bones out for him to chew while I sewed in the quilt room.

Here’s what happened:

In the end, I had to remove it from the whole room as there was no way JP was going to stand for it in his bed or on the floor. It was a DANGEROUS thing.

The next morning I tried again, this time upstairs after breakfast.

He eventually discovered he could chew it, and now he’s obsessed doing just that. Here’s this morning. So now I have one upstairs and one downstairs.

Yesterday we had a great walk at my neighbor’s—and as we were heading back toward the car, I slipped on a wooden bridge that I thought was dry—and twisted my ankle.

The little boy was right there to “help.” I leashed him and we limped back to the car where I had some 1M and 10M Arnica remedies that I always carry. The rest of the day, though, was spent hobbling around—so no second walk. And I took Arnica 30cc off and on for the rest of the day. It is astonishing how Arnica immediately reduces pain and swelling. Astonishing.

Today the ankle is much better, but I will still be hobbling around. I will likely be able to take JP for some sort of walk on flat ground though—and that will be good for the ankle as well.

BTW, studies now show that the RICE treatment of a twisted ankle is NOT the best strategy and can slow healing. RICE is Rest, Ice, Compression, and Elevation. Advice now is to keep using the ankle as much as possible, that ice can retard healing as blood and inflammation are needed to heal, that elevation means rest rather than keeping the injury mobile, and that compression in RCT studies didn’t matter.

Here’s a link to one study: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3396304/

So, I kept moving yesterday, but also spent some time mid-afternoon just watching tv. This morning, as I said, the swelling has reduced a lot, the pain is way better, and all is clearly much better.

It is MUCH colder all at once. I need to switch out some of my summer clothes, especially my pajamas, summer sweaters, summer t-shirts, and so forth. I’m going to try to do that with the puppy in a bit, and then we’ll attempt a walk.