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This is what's been going on with me: As you may remember, I adopted a dog last

month. He's really doing quite well with his manners. Even so far as his

leash work is going. He is still to young for balance work though. Polar used

to be called Snowfoot when he was living with his foster dad who is a volunteer

with the County Pet Rescue.

I've attached some pictures of Polar where his new back pack. I have a Service

Dog in Training patch that I will be attaching when I can get some strong

thread. Last week, I took Polar to the groomer. Messy Mutts is the name of the

shop and it even has places for people who want to bathe and groom their own

dogs. Polar had a massive amount of hair tangled up in his undercoat. It was

like one massive sheet of felted hair. The groomer used a Ferminator before

she washed him and got a lot of that loose hair out. It ended with me having to

bring Polar back on Friday, so that she could blow out the rest of the loose

hair. Polar has been shedding a lot of hair, or so it seems to me. The vet

said to give it a couple more months to see if things settle down. I've had

Polar 4 1/2 weeks. I've got some pictures of Polar attached. One of them is a

picture of Polar and his groomer, Rhonda. It was taken on Friday after she had

finished with him.

As for me, I fell again, twice in the last 3 days. I've had a mild aching in my

head and I'm not sure if the headache is what's caused the problem, or if it's

my feet not doing what I want. You know, I can go weeks without falling; but,

sometimes, it seems like I'm falling all of the time.

My youngest son, Marcus, is still not riding in the car. He walks everywhere.

I don't know what he would do if he had to be referred to a doctor out of town.

He is off school until Monday now.

My oldest son has dental problems which can't be fixed because his dentist says

that there is nothing he can do any longer. I don't know if anybody in the

group lives in Washington state besides me; but, our state is experiencing

financial problems so to try to remedy the situation, a bunch of cuts have been

made. Medicaid doesn't cover dental services any longer for adults, except for

those adults that have Medicaid through DDD. My son's Medicaid is through SSI.

He needs hospital dentistry. I've tried contacting the Medicaid office of DSHS

and keep getting connected to a recorded message which tells me to go to a web

site. So, I fill out a form on the web site and still have not heard anything.

Nick has a high level of anxiety and it takes him a while before he can settle

down in the dentist chair. There have been several times when he has been

unable to settle. The last attempt to have a tooth extraction was the third try

for the same tooth. Nick needs hospital dentistry, so that he can go under

general anesthesia.

There is one dentist in town that will do hospital dentistry. When he has a

patient under, he does everything the patient needs to have done including

cleaning, fillings, extractions. We are not in a position to pay for a dentist,

anesthesiologist, plus whatever charges the hospital adds in.

I think there is a school of dentistry either at Washington State U. or the

University of Washington; but, even so, there's no way for us to get there.

Donna in WA

4 of 4 Photo(s)

Polar

Polar's