Catching up with the girls

It feels like a long time since my last post. And it really was a long time!

How have our doggies been doing? Quite fine, actually.

 

Aschiuta, the picky eater?

I jokingly say that Aschiuta is a goat. She eats things you wouldn't think a dog would enjoy. She eats fruit, such as apples or bananas and also pieces of bell peppers or even cucumber peelings! Yes, our little goat crunches them as if they were the tastiest treats.

But lately, Aschiuta has started to be a bit picky about food. Maybe she just doesn't enjoy Acana much. But there is one trick to convincing her to eat her kibble.

What do you mean, diet kibble?!

 

I give both Aschiuta and Nightmare some yoghurt or sour cream each day, since it is the best way to administer Nightmare's medication. For some reason, Aschiuta first goes to her bowl and pushes the kibble around with her nose instead of eating it. It took me a while to catch on, but it seems she is actually trying to stir the kibble around and coat it with the dairy. Sometimes, she even walks away without eating. When I realised what she was trying to do, I stirred her kibble myself before serving it to her. Bowl licked clean!

 

Nightmare, figure skater!

Nightmare's seizures have stopped since she started taking the epilepsy medication every day. Phew! But she still has some issues with coordination sometimes, especially after just waking up.

I think the shiny flooring doesn't help either... We have laminate wood and tile flooring; even I slide around in the kitchen as if I were a child on the icy roads during winter. But Nightmare also overdoes everything. You could say that her enthusiasm is always one step ahead of her and her feet (and bottom) are trying to catch up.

She jumps on the couch and over the little table and runs up and down the stairs, she is a real whirl. She just sometimes skid or slip and lands on a belly flop, the poor girl. Even yesterday she missed the couch and landed on the floor, knocking one of the wheels off the little table. I found one of the pieces across the room!

She is fine walking normally on non-slippery ground, but she can be a real figure skater in the house. What a figure!

She likes to sleep up on the radiator. But if she rolls over in her sleep she tumbles down on the couch!

Nightmare's seizures

I have so much to catch up! Let me tell you about Nightmare's seizures and how we are managing them.

The first seizure

The first time it happened, I was upstairs and my husband called me to come quickly because Nightmare was having a seizure. She had never had one before, but it was unmistakable. She was on her side, her legs spasming involuntarily, as if she were trying to swim, and she was drooling. We held her head to avoid her hitting it and wiped her mouth. It was thankfully over in about a minute or so.

We of course rushed her to the vet. He examined her and sent us to give her a head CAT scan As you might remember, she had had a deeply infected wound on her forehead when we found her.

The diagnosis and treatment

We went and did the tomography (that was a huge ordeal, I was the one to go in with her and Nightmare doesn't like to be handled and held). The results didn't show much, nothing we were afraid of, such as a tumor, but there was some liquid accumulated.

That is the fluid buidup

We showed our vet the results and he concluded it wasn't epilepsy, but maybe high pressure in her brain that was causing her the seizures.

He gave us some supplements for circulation and told us to be careful that her gums wouldn't turn purple, which meant she wasn't getting enough oxygen. We wouldn't have to worry about her swallowing her tongue as with humans, in fact, he advised against putting our hands in her mouth, as she could clench her jaws and hurt us.

If the situation worsened, he would prescribe her some epilepsy medication.

The seizures become more frequent

Over the next few months, even with the meds, Nightmare still had seizures, more and more often, even twice in one day.

We went to the vet again and he decided to start on the epilepsy medicine for dogs.

The seizures stop

We were giving her three types of pills every day at this point, but she was a good girl and took it. To avoid shoving the pills down her throat, we put them between two layers of cream or yoghurt and she ate them right up.

And it really showed an improvement. The epilepsy pills completely suppressed the seizures and she hasn't had one in many months now.

The vet stopped one of the supplements and even if it costs us quite a bit each month, we are happy she is feeling ok.

Snoooooore!

The runs!

Sorry for not writing in a while, we do have some catching up to do. Let me tell you about Aschiuta's tummy problems...

I think it was last spring or summer when we had to go away without the dogs. When that happens, we leave them at a dog hotel that we had been leaving Aschiuta at before. The owner is a vet and Aschiuta had always been very comfortable there. He even spayed her.

But this time, the vet didn't have time to take care of the dog hotel full time himself like he did before, so he didn't take in many guests. But since we were repeat clients and he was fond of Aschiuta, he took the girls in.

One of the sad parts of dog hotels is that some owners drop their dogs there and never go back for them. The vet was kind hearted though and kept those dogs along, as permanent guests. So there were a lot of barks when we dropped the girls off.

Since the vet was very busy, the caretaker, who was an older man (I think it was his father) was going to take care of Aschiuta and Nightmare as well. We dropped some food, toys and a couple of blankets and left the doggies at the hotel.

Nightmare was also to be spayed during that time. She recovered ok, however she did have a small bump around the stitches which was solved with antibiotics. At this point, our usual vet believed there should be a longer period of antibiotics than the dog hotel vet.

All in all, when we returned, we picked up the doggies. I'm not sure (here is where writing about this sooner would have helped), but I think they did say Aschiuta had softer stools and to take care of that.

And indeed, Aschiuta had a very upset tummy and very loose and frequent stools. We had to run out every couple of hours and sometimes she didn't even manage to reach our usual bushes. We were still living in the old apartment back then, so I did my share of cleaning the building staircase and even outside on the alley pavement. Poor little one!

We phoned the vet at the hotel and he did say that the dogs had received some other kind of food after the one we brought had run out. But it was decent quality food that all the dogs ate without issues. But Aschiuta is a bit more sensitive.

We also called our regular vet and he prescribed Smecta, which is a medicine used to treat diarrhoea in humans. He said to put the medicine in her water and make her drink. She drank some of it (it was the vanilla flavoured kind) and I must say it actually worked. She got better very soon after. I think this whole ordeal lasted a couple of days and I was desperate. It is a good thing that she didn't have any other symptoms. Talk about a miracle cure! And I definitely don't believe in that sort of stuff.

Our vet sure has a few tricks up his sleeve. He has also prescribed activated charcoal (also a brand for humans) when I was afraid the doggies had swallowed some raisins. You must know that grapes and raisins should not be given to dogs. Some dogs eat several without issues, while others have serious problems because of just one. Luckily, our poochies hadn't actually eaten any. I also gave Aschiuta charcoal when she ran away from home and dumpster dove around the supermarket nearby. Just for precaution, the charcoal is supposed to absorb any bad chemicals my crazy pooch must have eaten.

I didn't eat nuttin'!

I hope you have such attentive and resourceful vets too and may you and your pets stay healthy!