Do not read this if you're squemish

Today I learned two things:

1. My wife is an even more awesome person than I thought
2. I understand better why she needs a hiatus from the vet tech world

But first, a little background. I have a condition known as hyposmia, which means I have a diminished sense of smell. Thinking back, I can't even remember when I started noticing it. I just remember that in college that I wouldn't pick up on scents quite as fast as other people. If I had to guess, I would blame it on the chemotherapy. It's not an entirely bad thing. Sure, I have a harder time noticing when my wife has started dinner, but I have an easier time being around gassy people. You get the idea.

Chester, our 11 year-old dog, has a list of "health issues". He's on, among other things, an antidepressant, which is a story for another time. One of the other issues he has is expressing his anal glands. Anal glands are just what they sound like: glands back by the anus. And they stink. They are how dogs mark their territory. They are why dogs sniff each other's butts when they meet. Have you ever wondered why dogs sometimes wipe their butts across the floor? Their glands have somehow gotten clogged and they are trying to relieve the pressure.

As of late, Chester has been licking himself incessantly. In my wife's professional judgement, this meant that his glands needed to be manually expressed. She said she tried doing it last week, but was not able to do it herself. So guess what we got to do tonight?

So picture this...



Now imagine that the dog weighs 45 pounds. Imagine he does not want to be there because his glands are rather clogged, making this procedure a bit painful, however necessary it is. Image that someone is holding him like you would carry a bundle of sticks, but that someone is kneeling in the snow in 17º weather. Imagine that the "express-or" is having trouble getting the glands to express, so repeated trials are necessary. Imagine the dog is screaming bloody murder at each attempt and uses all of it's strength to try to free himself.

Now imagine that you are the one holding the dog, talking to him, trying to calm him down. Now imagine that even with your diminished sense of smell, you are suddenly overcome by an oily, fishy, ammonia odor that coats your nose, even from several feet away. Imagine that the aforementioned dog gets even more nervous and decides that several small bowel movements are the way to go, and that the smells mingle into an unholy amalgamation of what can only be described as a "vile stench".

Apparently that was the sort of thing that my wife had to deal with on a fairly regular basis. Well, maybe except for the kneeling in the snow part. That's why I have a new level of appreciation for my wife today.