Dexter Had Surgery

Dexter had surgery on April 16, 2025 to remove a small growth on his foot. I wanted to share his story & journey!

If you’re interested, I made a “Dexter with a Bandage” vinyl sticker while I was caring for him post-surgery. It’s super cute and available on Etsy!

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Discovering the Growth

At the beginning of April, I noticed a small red spot on Dexter’s left hind foot. His allergies cause a lot of skin irritation so I wasn’t alarmed. I made a mental note to keep an eye on it.

On Saturday April 5th, the spot started to bleed. Everywhere. And it broke loose on the carpet. I called Dexter to the kitchen since the hard floor is easier to clean. There were bloody footprints all over. We’d recently purchased a Bissell Little Green Cleaner and attacked the carpet instantly. What a first test of the new machine - but it worked and left no stains!

Since it happened on a weekend, I took Dexter to a walk-in urgent care veterinarian for some help. At this point I thought we were dealing with an allergy or injury. Unfortunately, the vet checked his foot and said it felt like a growth - maybe a mast cell tumor or histiocytoma. She said she could biopsy it but it would probably bleed even more, and the blood might make the biopsy useless anyway. She recommended seeing our regular vet on Monday and suspected they’d want to remove the growth.

Back at home, I had some vet wrap on hand. I’d actually bought it several years ago thinking “someday I might need this” and that someday had arrived. I used that plus a non adherent pad to wrap Dexter’s paw until it quit bleeding. I was really worried about wrapping it too tightly and cutting off circulation so I wrapped it as loosely as I could.

We limped along (literally!) until Monday.

Vet Appointment

On Monday April 7, we visited our regular vet. Dexter’s foot had finally calmed down and wasn’t bleeding constantly but it was still red and irritated. They did a fine needle aspiration and looked at a sample of the lump under a microscope. The good news: it was definitely not a mast cell tumor! The bad news: we still didn’t know what it was. It did seem to be an abnormal growth, perhaps a histiocytoma or basal cell tumor but neither really fit perfectly.

Regardless, it needed to go - it was small enough to take off easily and would get more difficult to take off if it continued to grow. We did pre-op bloodwork and scheduled surgery for Wednesday April 16. They sent me home with an antibiotic/steroid drop to put on the growth to help calm it down and stop the tendency to bleed.

Dexter shortly after his surgery with a bandage on his foot

Surgery Day

In the nine days that followed, Dexter’s growth doubled in size. Luckily it was still small enough to take off easily. I knew we’d made the right choice in scheduling surgery though with growth at that rate.

The surgery went fine and we picked Dexter up in the afternoon. His foot had half a dozen stitches and was bleeding a bit so they bandaged it for us. Our instructions were to take the bandage off in a little while and leave it uncovered after that.

I thought Dexter would be sleepy after surgery - NOPE! He was REALLY fussy and whiny and we started to worry that he was in pain. He finally settled late in the evening. He had a small meal and slept the night.

The paper about anesthesia aftercare that they gave me said "Dexter may be sleepy and wobbly until tomorrow morning. However, some pets may have the opposite effect and seem agitated and whiny."

We got agitated and whiny.

Covering the incision before we went outside

Day 1 Post-Op

The next morning, Dexter was full of bouncy energy. He wanted to run and play. Zoomies ensued. We spent most of the day trying desperately to keep him calm.

I was glad he was feeling good at least. He didn’t seem to have any issues with pain after all.

The next challenge was keeping the incision clean. We’d asked the vet’s office how to keep the incision clean when we took Dexter outside. They recommended cling wrap since it sticks to itself. It didn't actually stay as well as I hoped so I started putting vet wrap higher on his leg to hold it on.

I took it off as soon as we got back inside. Clean and dry foot!!!

Surprisingly, Dexter had no interest whatsoever in licking his foot. We had a cone on hand if we needed it, but we didn’t use it at this point.

Day 3 Post-Op

Two of Dexter's favorite friends (my brother in law and his wife) stopped to visit him. We pointed out Dexter's incision. Dexter went straight to his buttons and said "ouch". Since this isn’t a word Dexter uses very often, I was really surprised. He knew exactly what we were talking about and had something to add to the conversation. (He had pain meds but I'm sure it was still bothersome).

PS: if you’re not familiar with the “talking buttons”, I have a YouTube video about it!

Pink and swollen incision

Day 5 Post-Op

I really did not like the looks of Dexter’s incision on Monday morning, Day 5 post-op. It was pink and swollen. Worse yet, Dexter desperately wanted to lick the incision now. I sent a photo of his foot to the vet.

I was most worried about infection. The real answer surprised me but made sense: the vet thought Dexter was allergic to his stitches. Of course he’d be allergic to his stitches. He’s allergic to everything. They assured me this is actually not uncommon.

He’d been sent home with anti-inflammatory pain meds and we were told to continue those to help with the swelling. I could also try a cold compress. The stitches were supposed to come out in 10-14 days but now they recommended day 9, given his reaction.

Day 7 post-op and looking pretty bad

Day 7 Post-Op

Or not. On Day 7, his foot looked worse yet. I checked in with the vet again.

This time, there was some sticky goo - maybe pus? - around the incision so they prescribed antibiotics. Given that Dexter was having quite an ugly reaction to the stitches, they also said I could bring him in the following day (Day 8 post-op) to have the stitches removed. The stitches weren’t doing us any good at this point.

Dexter was in a cone full time now. He had a special hatred for the plastic cone so I bought him a soft cone. He still hated this one but was a bit more comfortable. It worked well at first, but he did eventually figure out that he could crumple it down and get around it. Once he discovered that, it was useless.

Day 8 Post-Op

When Dexter realized I was getting ready to take him to the vet, he tried to hide. I’ve been doing the “talking buttons” with Dexter for years now and he understands a lot of what we say. I told him "stitches go bye, but we have to go to the vet so stitches go bye".

Am I crazy to think he understood me? Dexter usually hates the car but was pretty cooperative about getting in. He also usually makes a scene if the vet tech takes him back without me, but he went right back with them. I have no doubt the stitches hurt and itched and he wanted rid of them.

Pathology Results

Since we weren’t sure what the growth actually was, we had it sent to a lab… and the results are BACK! It was a histiocytoma and is benign. They got the whole thing so it shouldn’t return.

We’d suspected all along that it was benign but it was so nice to hear it confirmed!