Mango's eating disorder

So Mango ate my chocolate earlier in the week. First off, that bitch. No one messes with a woman and her chocolate. Secondly though, I had an interesting conversation with Beckie.

I had to call her and fess up that Mango had eaten some mildly important Playschool papers that I was going to give Beckie. Somehow that led Beckie to say, "You know I give Taz Pepcid, right?" No, I hadn't known that. And I hadn't even told her about the chocolate bar yet.

She explained the vet we both take our animals to had long ago recommended giving her dog, Taz, Pepcid. He doesn't get it every day, but I guess most days. I asked her if he recommends this for all dogs, or only some. She replied that it was specific to Taz's case because he was eating whatever crap that was laying around the house, was eating all day long, burped a lot, etc. I said, "Um, that's Mango to a T."

"Oh yeah, you've said that before, that it's like Mango has an eating disorder."

That's right she does, although my mom just called it Pica.

So I'd previously put two and two together about the missing chocolate and the throw up on the floor, but it hadn't yet occured to me about the paper that Mango has been eating all week. See, normally she'll pick off some random object if we've left the dogs home alone for too long. And usually only when we're away from the house, or if we've committed some particularly attrocious crime, according to dog mores. But every time I turned a corned this week there was some half-eaten paper laying on the ground.

I expressed my confusion (as to why all of a sudden she was doing this) aloud many times throughout the week. But not until I was on the phone with Beckie did I realize that dark chocolate is extremely acidic and by eating the paper Mango was probably trying to neutralize her stomach and alliviate the heartburn she must have been experiencing from eating Mama's sweets!

So I went to the store today to get Pepcid. I can't believe no one (Beckie nor the vet) ever mentioned that to me before, but it makes perfect sense. Mango took a dose today and I have left the house, we'll see the status when I get back.