Holy crap, Gail!
Oh, that poor guy!!!!!
Interestingly, hubby knows a guy who had a similar incident with his dog--only it took them a year to find the stick!
It was a chance xray that showed it--the whole thing had healed over without infection, but there were weird symptoms (gagging, coughing, etc) that had plagued the poor dog the whole time! So thank goodness you found it so quickly!
Speedy recovery, Lightning!!