One-Eyed Jack
This is Jack. He's one of our senior Jack Russell Terriers. We rescued him in 2004 when he was about 4 years old. His family told us he never listened and was impossible to train. They said he wouldn't come when called and he wandered away frequently.
One day Jack wandered off and was picked up by a lady near the old 7-11 store in Evergreen. She contacted Jack's owners and they said she could keep him if she wanted to. It just so happened she was a volunteer with EAPL (Evergreen Animal Protective League). She fostered Jack for EAPL and they put him up for adoption.
Being the suckers we are for JRTs we saw him and decided to adopt him. We called the former owners and they gave us the rundown on his poor behavior and history.
My wife picked him up and brought him home. Within about 5 minutes we'd diagnosed his "behavioral" problem. Jack was deaf. He'd been deaf since birth. Anyway, Jack quickly became a member of the family.
About a year after we adopted him his eyes started to look cloudy. We took him to the vet who recommended a doggy ophthalmologist. Jack had a condition that was causing the lenses in his eyes to detach from the retina (or whatever it is they're attached to). It was very serious and potentially fatal without surgery. $3000 worth of surgery. The doc was able to reattach the lens in his right eye but the left lens had to be removed. He recovered and seemed to have fairly normal vision. Until recently.
In late 2012 his right eye started to get really cloudy again and he eventually lost sight in that eye. Earlier this year it seemed to really be bothering him. So, several visits to the vet later, we wound up making the decision to have his right eye removed (enucleation). That was about 2 weeks ago. For the first few days after the surgery he looked like he'd gone about 15 rounds with Mike Tyson. But he's recovered nicely and the fur is starting to grow back around his eye. The doc placed a small, silicon prosthesis in the eye socket and then sewed it shut. It looks like he has a permanent wink! He hasn't had sight in that eye for a few months so he really doesn't seem to miss not having vision on that side. Also seems healthier now that the bad eye is gone. His appetite has improved and his coat is much softer. I guess he's just healthier overall.
Jack is just another in our long list of special needs dogs. We seem to be attracted to the "problem children". But that's OK...they need homes, too.
My suggestion to avoid the expensive surgeries was to let him go blind and change his name to "Helen". Wife didn't think that was funny.
"One-Eyed" Jack:
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Originally Posted by whitbaby
