DOG BITE UPDATE

Abbie is all healed up and apparently none the worse for wear. She still has a scab on the bridge of her nose but all her other punctures, lacerations, stitches, etc., are completely healed.

The irony is.... just a week after she was bitten, our other granddaughter, 7-year-old Gracie, was bitten by a dog, another Lab, in the face, and had to get 4 sutures in her nose.

Both granddaughters in one week, 250 miles apart, same kind of notoriously-gentle dog.

Gracie did not take well to her emergency care. Daughter Valerie, her mom, said it took 3 people to hold her while she screamed, "Please don't kill me, please don't kill me! I'm only 7 years old!!!" Even under that kind of duress, she is such a card.

However, all sewed up, she was OK. Insisted on going to school next day, bruises, swelling, stitches and all (she was probably some kind of celebrity among her schoolmates...."Wow, did you see Gracie? She got bitten by a dog.... woooowwwww.... ) Valerie reports she is not showing any fear of her boxer dog or her stepmother's Lab. The owners of the offending Lab have shipped it off to Grandma's to live. They haven't seen how Gracie reacts to dogs outside her own family. I think she is more at risk for dog-fear than Abbie.

Some might find it odd that my big concerns, along with possible facial scars and emotional trauma, still include, "Will they still be able to enjoy dogs?" It might seem that after having 2 grandkids bitten in the face in one week I'd want all kids, especially mine, kept away from dogs. But I am a carved-in-granite dog-lover. I feel they add so much richness to our lives, giving us companionship, unrivaled response to our every approach, maybe a fulfilling hobby, and, one of my own primary dog-owning purposes, protection. I don't want my grandchildren, or their parents (who are, of course, my own children) turned off of dogs.