The Life!

Welcome to our world! This is all she wants to do now!!! She just wants to lay in her bed!! 

We walk into her little room and she rolls around, wanting her belly scratched, her neck scratched and under arms scratched!

What a silly girl! She has US trained pretty good!

Enjoy the day!

Who is this dog?

Truly? Aside from her loss of appetite.....if you saw Gabby, you'd think we were making all of this up!!
This morning she peed us a RIVER outside and made a somewhat normal poopsie! We gave her the usual Rimadyl dosage wrapped in cheese and the anti-biotic and she ate that without hesitation. We left her alone for a few hours and returned to see she made herself at home by hopping onto the couch in her usual position!!!
She is also aware of someone knocking/opening the front door and BARKS like the good ole days!! JUST NOW, as I'm typing ate her breakfast from this morning!! YEAH!!
The big question of the day......ARE WE DONE NOW!??
We reluctantly gave her the Rimadyl dosage today. We'll call the vet next week and discuss our alternatives - WITHOUT Rimadyl.
Thanks for checking in with her. Knowing we've got people cheering her on sure helps us. These darn animals, they capture our hearts, go through the good, bad and ugly with us through our crazy lives and we just can't think what life would be like without them faithfully by our sides. Sure is a blow to the soul when they are hurting. As much as we try to keep it all in perspective, when faced with the inevitable, it sucks.
Thanks again for your love and support. I've gotta run and go cuddle with my 4 legged buddy!

On the UP side!!

After a very lazy, restful day.....Gabby finally ate her food - after hand feeding her a bunch.....then, she went down to potty what appeared to be clear urine!! We did a double check, and yup, no blood!!! Hallelujah!!!!

She finished her bowl of food too!!! HALLELUJAH!!

She drank a bunch of water!!! HALLELUJAH!!!

She's been 'asking' to get up on the couch to sit next to us too!!!! FIRST TIME in a looooong time!!! HALLELUJAH!!!

We DID NOT give her any Rimadyl today since we are giving her the antibiotic.....just giving that a rest and let the antibiotic do its job....

When asked to do her trick of 'telling me a story' we get a nice, healthy BARK!!! YEAH!!! She's coming around!!!

A lot to be encouraged by!!! Keep it going Gabby!! Let's get through this bump in the road!! HALLELUJAH!!!

Slight Change

This morning there was less blood on her puppy pads and the blood appeared lighter in color. She still hasn't eaten anything but the cheese we wrap around her pills. She appears to be resting comfortably in her bed all last night and this morning. We are getting ready to take her on a walk so we'll see how that goes.

It's a Urinary Tract Infection?

We picked Gabby up at 4:30 this afternoon.  The Dr. showed us a sonogram photo of her bladder. Lots of white area with 'crystals' jumping all over the place! WHAT?! HOW? He says dogs can get this just like humans….he says it is a very in-depth and very long scientific reason behind it but basically, yeah, what they eat can cause this. As the crystals leave the bladder they are slicing her along the path!!

Now what? Well, she was given a shot of antibiotics, urine drawn and sent to the lab with results to follow in 3-5 days. With the results they will be able to verify they are treating her for the right thing. We were given a bag of special UTI food and sent on our way.

She's been resting most of the day. Has not eaten anything and drank a little bit. She weighed 27 pounds last Monday and now weighs 26 pounds.

My questions that keep going over in my mind are:
1. Do dogs vomit with a UTI?
2. Do dogs have blood in their stool with a UTI?
3. Do dogs lose appetite with a UTI?
4. Do dogs have diarrhea with a UTI?

Seems a huge coincidence that her Rimadyl was increased and then these last issues arose. Reading the link I posted on the previous blog is pretty scary! I really don't want to give it to her anymore. It states to give aspirin for joint pain instead but its going to take awhile of being off of all Rimadyl before I can give her the aspirin. So, the plan now is to let the UTI meds kick in, get rid of that problem, then I will tell the vet that I'm taking her off of the Rimadyl and ask him how long it'll take before I can begin aspirin/other methods.

So…that's all for now. As you can guess it is very very frustrating. As with humans, antibiotics can kick in pretty quick for a UTI. Let's hope and pray the same for our little Gabby.

Dr.'s Response

Dr. Called after sending the email...he is positive the amount of medication given did not exceed acceptable amounts for her size. On the site it claims 1 mg per pound. Gabby weighs 26 pounds today, she list a pound since last week. We've been giving her 10 mg once a day for 3 years. At this time we don't know the amount of injection on Thursday. She's been taking 2 times a day 10 mg since Friday, with exception of last night. 20 mg daily still fits within the amount she could take. My concern is the injection. How much was that? Did that 'put her over the edge?

After reading some of the comments on the page link, it sounds like these are also SIDE EFFECTS of just taking the drug! We watched the movie Dallas Buyers Club last night about the HIV/Aids medicine in the 80's. Couldn't help but find similarities here.

Drug overdose?

So during our walk prior to taking her to the vet, she let loose a bunch of bright red blood. I'm not exactly sure if it came out of urine or poopsie....nonetheless, she had diahrrea so we scooped it up and brought it with us.

After evaluating her, vet decided to keep her and run some tests. He discussed side effects of the Rimadyl. After reading the link below that my daughter Amy sent to me while we were at the vet, there is no doubt in our minds that she is experiencing a drug overdose or the Rimadyl just caught up with her....

http://www.rimadylsideeffects.net/rimadyl-overdose-is-rimadyl-dangerous-for-my-dog/

I emailed the link to the doctor as soon as I finished reading.....She has experienced every single one of the side effects!! He gave her a shot of Rimadyl before we took her home on a Thursday. We've been giving it to her as directed twice a day since Friday. Because of her vomiting last night, we didn't give it to her last night.

Let's hope and pray we caught it in time!  We plan on picking her up at 4:00 this afternoon.