Hi everyone, sorry to take so long getting back but it has been a real roller coaster of a day. We couldn't get her in this morning when Joie was booked in for his grooming so had to leave her home alone with her cone collar on. I was crying uncontrollably standing outside waiting for DH to pick me up and hearing her mournful howls. (She is a bit of a drama queen but it didn't help when I already felt bad about it all).
We had an meeting to go to and got back home around 11. I took off her collar so she could drink some water and she went and laid down with DH for awhile. When she got up sure enough she had scratched it open again.
When I got to the vet Violet looked like she had gone three rounds with Rocky Balboa. The vet said it could be infected because of an initial scratch, but because new patches were popping up she was wondering about mites. So they did a skin scraping and it came clean so it is being treated as an infected eye (there is puss coming from the tear duct. So she is on anti-biotic and cream for 2 weeks and back in the office in 10 days.
She is fast asleep right now on her bed beside me - it has been a rough day on both of us. The entire bill for both of the dogs, medicine and tests was 3 times what was budgeted for the original visit. But I can't put a price on what these two mutts mean to us. But to add more to it, our awesome groomer, the only one with the patience to work through Joie's fears and behaviour problems (from way before we got him) told me today this will be his last visit with her as she is moving to the island. I wanted to break down and cry right then but held out at least until I got to the car.
Thanks so much for everyone's concern, encouragement and help. She is obviously still in discomfort from it, but hearing her snoring right now is music to my ears!