When we got Oscar trimmed last week he came home with his hair cut pretty close to the skin. This will allow him to stay cool during the upcoming summer months, which I’m sure he will appreciate. It also allowed us to see all the things that his fur had been hiding like his long fingernails and the little bumps on his stomach. I had noticed these bumps before, ever since he was a puppy. Most people may not notice such things, but since I have been taught to monitor the moles or freckles on my own fair skin, I’ve always been aware of his little spots.
So when his fresh haircut showed us the mole that had suddenly turned black, I was alarmed. I don’t know much about moles or bumps, but I do know that changing color or shape is not good. I know this because when a mole I had beneath my skin had started changing colors after years of benign existence, I had to have it removed and several stitches put in its place.
The memory of this incident stirred me into action and I told the CPA that we needed to take Oscar to the vet. Which is why I spent 50 minutes waiting in the vet’s office after work last night. Fifty minutes of worry over this little mole that I just knew was cancerous, which meant that Oscar would need a biopsy and then surgery and finally a CAT scan (or perhaps a DOG scan?) to make sure the cancer hadn’t spread to other organs.
With this diagnosis firmly in my mind, you can imagine my surprise when the doctor took one look at Oscar’s bump and said,
“Oh, that’s not a mole, that’s his teat.”
“I’m sorry, his what?”
I don’t know if it’s just because I find the word “teat” hysterically funny or because I was so surprised to learn that Oscar had one (actually, he has six of them). But either way, I was momentarily stunned.
“You mean it’s not a mole? A mole that has cancer and needs to be removed?”
“Oh no, it’s just one of his teats, or nipples, and the black stuff is probably some bacteria. We’ll just clean it off and then you can put this ointment on it for a few days and he’ll be good.”
I still couldn’t wrap my brain around this. Moments earlier I had thought my dog was dying and now I found out he had nipples. I didn’t know which was more upsetting. So I asked the doc, “Just to clarify: boy dogs have nipples?”
“Of course! Guys have nipples too, don’t they? Why would boy dogs be any different?”
Point taken.
I guess you learn something new every day!
I have to ask: Did you know that boy dogs have nipples? Do you take your pet to the vet when you see something that looks different than normal?
What we do for our animals.
30 comments