Her First Litter ~ Part 2

Double click on these pictures to enlarge them. They are pictures taken of pictures...so the quality is not great.

The weeks flew by and Chrissy kept getting larger and rounder. I made her special meals that included scrambled eggs or cottage cheese mixed into her normal kibbles. As those last days came and went, I noticed she was starting to have a difficult time of everything..from relieving herself to just moving. Corgi's are 'low riders' anyway and at this point Chrissy's stomach was dragging on the ground!

I called the vet and made an appointment for that afternoon.

"Oh My!" a lady commented as we walked through the door. "Obviously here to check into the maternity ward!"

Chrissy sat on the tile floor, panting as her back legs just slid outward from her body. Our name was called and we slowly made our way down the hall and into the exam room. The tech groaned as she picked Chrissy up and put her on the table. Dr. Taylor came in and gave Chrissy a scratch on the head. Before he had the chance to ask I said, "She is not due for another 5 days!"

He did a basic exam and it was easy to see that although uncomfortable, she was not in any terrible pain.

"Let's x-ray her and see how many pups she is carrying." He suggested.

We led her into the x-ray room and I handed over her leash, opting to wait in the waiting room. Several minutes passed. I could hear movement in the room, but it did not sound like Chrissy was putting up any kind of argument. Several more minutes passed. I picked up a magazine and flipped through it. It did not offer the distraction I had hoped it would. I glanced down at my watch. 20 minutes had gone by and now I was getting anxious. I could hear sounds of muffled speech but could not make out what they were saying. I was dying to know!

Twenty four minutes after they entered the x-ray room, the door slowly opened. I jumped to my feet saying, "Is she okay?"

"Yes Chrissy is just fine. Can you come in here for a minute?" The tech asked.

I was half way into the door before she finished the question. There Chrissy sat content on the floor...still panting. Her x-ray was on the light screen where the tech directed me. We studied the image as she explained.

"We wanted to do the x-ray to count how many puppies she is carrying. It will help you to know when she is done or if she has one more pup to go when she delivers." Pointing to the image she continued. "We started to try and count heads...one - two - three - four - five - six - seven and ... then we tried to count spines..one - two- three- four- five- six- seven - eight....and well... There are just so many puppies inside of her little body, we could not tell for sure how many she is carrying. WE know it is at LEAST 8!"

The tech looked at me waiting for a comment. Nothing came out of my mouth..even though it was hanging wide open. I was just astounded. A large litter for a Corgi is 6 and now this first time Mommy was carrying at least 8...all seemingly good sized pups too and she still had 5 more days to go!

to be continued...