My poor Grace

I had a herding trial with Grace today. She got stepped on by a cow. She yelped for half a second but them seemed fine. She didn't limp or try to stop working the cattle so we continued. After the run I took her to the water and she drank and seemed fine. We headed over to the course that had sheep and we started our sheep run. She wasn't having any luck with a certain phase of the course so I stopped the run and took her off the field. Still she seemed perfectly normal. Then she stopped to go potty (#1) and it was pure blood! She peed pure blood! So the trial director called the emergency vet clinic in the area and another competitor who lives in the area had us follow her to the clinic. I didn't like this place at all but since the nearest vet besides them was about an hour away I didn't have a choice. Alex did call the vet in that was an hour away but they had 4 emergencies ahead of us so we stayed where we were at. The vet was in surgery and he was the only vet on call (it was Sunday). Her vital signs all looked normal except she had pale gums. I took her outside the vet clinic to see if she needed to potty again, sure enough, more blood this time it was thick and coagulated.

Finally the vet came into see us, about an hour and forty minutes after we arrived (we were told it would only be an hour). He basically said they need to monitor her, take X-Rays and put her on IV fluids. I have enough of a background with animals, veterinarians and the like that I asked what they thought they could see in an X-Ray. (X-Rays don't show much in the way of soft tissue, mostly just bones). The vet couldn't give me a good answer and they said they wanted to put her on fluids for a couple of hours before they x-rayed her.

So I asked, if it is so important that you x-ray her why wouldn't you do that first? Once again I didn't get a very clear answer. By this point her gums were pink, her heart rate remained perfect and she seemed as normal as ever. So we asked if they thought she was stable enough to go home or go to a local vet. They thought she was. I called my friends C. and L.and they called another vet whose the nicest guy ever, Dr. B (a close friend of theirs). C told him what was going on and Dr. B said to just watch her closely, monitor her fluid and make sure what is going in is coming out and if anything looked off at all take her to the emergency vet near our home.

For the past 3 hours she has been normal and happy. She went potty about an hour ago and it looked like normal urine, no blood. I'm watching her every movement and she seems to be fine. Me and Alex on the other hand, we need drugs to get through this! I did really good and didn't cry at the vets office, I waited until we were in the car. I also remained very calm in front of Grace, I didn't want her upset. So I'll keep you posted on her condition. So far it looks like she just had a kidney bruise or something similar. I know I made the right decision taking her home and monitoring her here. She's more relaxed and calm here and I know her normal disposition. No vet could know her like I do. I'm so relieved this wasn't more serious, but I remain cautious that it could be more serious.