Dog Bite

Tuesday morning found me at an urgent care center for a dog bite. The PA (physician's assistant) was impressed with the lack of swelling, noting that dog bites almost always get infected.

Two days earlier, I took in a stray dog walking by my house. When I've done this in the past, I've posted pictures of the dog online and heard from the owner within a few hours. Not so with this dog--he must have been dumped.

The next day, he and my dog got into a scrap over a food bowl and when I tried to push him away, he bit me. Have I mentioned the dog is an American bully, weighing about 50 pounds? It broke the skin and made my hand sore--I'm lucky it wasn't worse. Sometimes I have more courage than sense.

The PA didn't recommend a rabies shot even though I don't know whether the dog is vaccinated. She did recommend a tetanus shot, since my last one was just over 10 years ago, and wrote a prescription for Augmentin (an antibiotic). I got the tetanus shot but haven't filled the prescription for the antibiotic because the wound hasn't gotten infected. I rinsed my hand under running water for a few minutes and put on Neosporin and L. reuteri/B. coagulans yogurt. L. reuteri bacteria create bacteriocins (antibacterial agents) and helps speed healing. Later I added juice from a Biotiquest Ideal Immunity recipe I ferment.

Eating collagen and taking hyaluronic acid, which thicken your skin, might have helped keep the wounds from being deeper--the skin wasn't broken on the sorest part of my hand. I'm also glad I've regained a lot of grip strength in the past few years. Imagine what would have happened to my hand if it had been mostly bones and thin skin.

The dog has been sweeter than the blossoms on the trees aside from biting me. Oddly, I'm sad that he has to go. He's still here (confined to the enclosed porch) because Friday is the earliest appointment I could get to turn him over to Indianapolis Animal Care Services. I even called them and told them that he bit me, but they said it might be days before the police and an animal control officer could be sent out. If they show up tomorrow when I'm at work, who knows if they might take my dog into custody if he happens to be in the yard.

What to do about strays in the future? On the one hand, I want people and their dogs reunited. But I don't want to take care of another potentially vicious dog for a week.

Comments

Lowcarb team member said…

That was good of you to take in a stray dog, but the dog bite could have been so much worse.
I hope it is picked up okay on Friday.

All the best Jan

May 18, 2023

Lori Miller said…

Indeed. A Marion County sheriff's deputy recently died in a dog attack. https://www.wthr.com/article/news/local/adult-dies-child-injured-dog-bite-east-indianapolis/531-fc737e97-5c7f-43f6-bbdd-76eab7cb0fad

May 18, 2023

Blog Lineup Change

Bye-bye, Fathead. I've enjoyed the blog, but can't endorse the high-fat, high-carb Perfect Health Diet that somehow makes so much sense to some otherwise bright people. An astrophysicist makes some rookie mistakes on a LC diet, misdiagnoses them, makes up "glucose deficiency," and creates a diet that's been shown in intervention studies to increase small LDL, which can lead to heart disease. A computer programmer believes in the diet and doesn't seem eager to refute it because, perhaps, scientists are freakin' liars and while he's good at spotting logical inconsistencies, lacks some intermediate knowledge of human biology. To Tom's credit, he says it's not the right diet for everyone, but given the truckload of food that has to be prepared and eaten, impracticality of following it while traveling (or even not traveling), and unsuitability for FODMAPs sufferers, diabetics and anyone prone to heart disease (i.e., much of the population), I'm...

Collagen-filled Low Carb Burritos

Low-carb, grain-free Mexican food is hard to find, but it's easy to make your own at home. This recipe has an authentic ingredient: carne de lengua, or beef tongue. Don't be put off: beef tongue is tender, delicious, and full of collagen. Look for it directly from farmers in your area. To cook it, cut it in 1" to 1-1/2" slices and pressure cook for one hour. Enjoy the delicious broth as a bonus. Ingredients 1 slice cooked beef tongue, peeled and cut into small cubes 1 egg wrap (I use these from Egglife) 1/4 cup cooked black or pinto beans Chili pepper Oregano Garlic (powdered or minced) Cumin Guacamole (with no emulsifiers) Salsa Shredded cheddar cheese Sour cream or homemade cream cheese with no emulsifiers Put the egg wrap on a plate and put the beef and beans down the middle of it. Sprinkle with the herbs and spices. Wrap, turn over and microwave for 1-2 minutes. Spoon salsa over the burrito and sprinkle with cheese. Add guacamole and sour cream or homemade crea...

Not Only Cheaper, But Easier

A while back, I wrote about saving money on break time coffee and snacks. I haven't done very well putting it into practice. But a post by James Clear today got me thinking about it again: Warren Buffett uses a two-list system to prioritize things. Check it out --and follow the instructions. Using Buffett's two-list system, two of the goals I ended up with were taking care of myself and saving $400 more per month than I already am. As I said, I've been wanting to save money, and the system made me really focus on this. I came up with 11 money-saving ideas, six of which had to do with food. Buying hamburger in bulk. Ranch Foods Direct sells one-pound packages of 80% lean pastured ground beef in bundles of 20 for a lot less than Whole Foods. Sprouts only carries super-lean beef that's grass-fed, and it's more expensive, too. Not driving to Whole Foods. Whole Foods is out of my way, and saving a weekly trip saves gas. Coffee at home, tea at work. Tea is fr...

Palpitations Gone with Iron

Thanks to my internet friend Larcana, who alerted me to the connection between iron deficiency and palpitations, I doubled down on my iron supplements and, for good measure, washed them down with Emergen-C. It's a cold medicine with a mega-dose of vitamin C, plus B vitamins and minerals. I don't think vitamin C does anything for a cold (a friend bought the stuff and left it at my house the last time she visited), but vitamin C does help iron absorption. After doubling up on iron in the last three days, I feel back to normal. (I'd already been taking quite a bit of magnesium and potassium, so I probably had sufficient levels of those.) How did I get so low on iron? Maybe it was too many Quest bars instead of red meat when I had odd cravings during my dental infection recently. Maybe because it's too hard to find liver at the grocery store and I haven't eaten much of it lately. Maybe the antibiotics damaged my intestines . And apparently, I'm a heavy bleeder . ...

In Defense of Fast Food

Another modern trend - healthy food should be expensive, not nutrients-dense and preferably exotic, or you would be eating like plebs who live on a dollar McD menu. --Galina L. I don't try to jump over seven-foot hurdles, I look for one-foot hurdles I can step over. --Warren Buffett, pleb who eats at McDonald's Despite all the talk about wild-caught v. farmed, grass-fed v. CAFO and the vilification of fast food, a lot of us plebs benefit simply from carbohydrate restriction. But even though diabetes and obesity are rampant, and carb restriction alone would help millions of people, the impression is out there that you need to eat in a very specific way, far beyond just watching the carbs. Following a low-carb diet is already a high hurdle for many people. If some people want or need to raise the bar for themselves, that's fine with me, but there's no need to turn low-carb into a hurdle that a lot of people can't jump over. Organic produce and grass-fed or p...

Pain, Pain, Go Away!

Search This Blog