Foreign Body Ingestion in Crated Labrador Retriever

"One evening last January our sweet girl, Stella, started acting unusual. She was whining to go outside every 5 minutes and when we let her out, she was determined to eat grass. I figured her stomach must have just been upset and it was probably nothing. Labs are known for eating things they shouldn't, but Stella usually had a pretty strong stomach. Unfortunately, things escalated quickly and within the hour Stella had vomited at least 20 times. She couldn't hold anything down. My husband and I knew something was terribly wrong, so we rushed her to the nearest emergency veterinary clinic. I knew how expensive this type of care could be, but luckily, I had just begun working at Embrace a few months prior, so Stella was covered and we didn't have to think twice about it.

When we arrived at the emergency clinic, they immediately took her back for an x-ray of her stomach, along with some other tests. When the doctor came in with the results, my heart sank. As soon as I heard "foreign body in the intestines" I knew we were going to be in for a long few weeks. He explained to us that the object was linear, probably some sort of sock or blanket, and that since it could potentially perforate her intestine, she was going to need emergency surgery first thing in the morning at another vet hospital about 45 minutes away. We were told that the surgery could be slightly risky, but that Stella would be in the very best hands. This news was hard enough to swallow, and in these difficult moments, we were just so grateful that we didn't have to be stressing out over the financial aspect thanks to Embrace.

Luckily for us, Stella came through the surgery and is now happy, healthy, and loving life! The wonderful surgeons were able to remove the pieces of blanket that she had eaten. I later found a large chunk of the blanket in her kennel missing, so we assume she had gotten bored that day and decided to eat part of it. We kenneled Stella for almost three years when we would leave the house and she never touched her blanket... until this time. If anything can be learned from our story, monitor your dog if they have a blanket in their kennel. For us, we avoid blankets completely now. You just never know when your pup is going to have an unpredictable accident like Stella did, which is why pet insurance is so important. We saved thousands of dollars thanks to Embrace, and Stella was able to have the very best care possible. The claims process was easy and fast--we had our reimbursement check in the mail less than 2 weeks later! Thank you Embrace for saving our Stella girl, and for saving our wallet."