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unusual behavior

Maxxs_Mummy said:
...Do you have any ants that bite where you live? It sounds like a large blood sucking insect or similar might have bitten him. I think I would call the Vet back again and see what they say. I do know that bites can be pretty painful and can sometimes make even humans feel quite ill :(

I don't think we have big aunts. My backyard has ivy and some tall grass, and zack goes into the ivy behind the big palm tree. There are spiders, though not as much as some years when it rains more in the winter. I've been seeing small black aunts in the garden but i don't think they bite mammals. I've seen a mosquito or two around in the past couple of weeks.

I'm preparing to treat the yard with IGR and nematodes, and maybe DE if there's a safe way to do it. that should get rid of any crawling insects. i hope to do that this weekend, now that ive cancelled our social plans due to Zack being sick.

The lesions are around his lips, at the border of his little black nose, on top of his nose, a bit back from the border, under his lower jaw, one on his chest, and i found another one on the back of his neck which i can't see because the skin is black. Even the ones on white are hard to see, but easy to feel. They're firm and hard and have a rough center, they don't see edematous or swollen, but are not small or subtle to the touch.

I wonder if they were there all along--i think the vet would've noticed them yesterday? would they have popped up later last night? she might've missed them since you can't really see them until you know they're there from touching them. maybe she felt them and didn't thnk they were important?

the ones around his mouth make it seem like he was into something, eating something, but then, that wouldn't explain the one on the back of his neck or on his chest.

I called the vet and left a message for her to call. I know she is the only vet there toda and tomorrow and i tried to make an appointment but was told she's booked til Wednesday, so i might take him to see one of his other vets, if she doesn't call by noon, or after lunch. I'm so lucky to live in an area where there are several who are open on Sundays and are open fairly late. There's one I've not been to before that's open until 9pm M-F, and til 4pm on Sat and Sun. Business must be booming.

Again, with anal gland problems it can make the dogs constipated and quite poorly too - last week, Maxx had a case of impacted & infected anal glands and he was in so much distress it was unbelieveable, he was also very lethargic and grizzly :( My Vet gave me some antibiotics and painkillers for him and now he is fully recovered.

gosh, i'm glad he's ok, poor boy.
it sure makes a difference when they have something treatable, doesn't it?. the first month i had Zack, he was really sick and the worst part was, the vets didn't have any idea what it was or how to treat him--until i found Dr Shane, and then it changed from an untreatable mystery to a simple easily treated worm infestation. What a difference, what a relief!

zack very rarely did any scooting, and definitely wasn't constipated, having about 3 large easily passed stools a day. the vet asked if he scoots and i said he does sometimes when he either has to go, or right after. so she did it.

Are there any after effects of anal gland expression? I mean, like is there soreness or discharge?

There was an odor which now i don't smell, but apparently they put some kind of perfume on him to disguise the odor, or maybe they washed him, because that smell has been there too and is still there, a perfume smell.
 
Mary said:
Oh I so hope Zack is feeling better soon. His weakness could be dehydration...so I am glad he got some fluids. So hard when they can't tell us what is bothering them. Will be thinking of you and Zack. Keep us posted.

i think his not eating and drinking has more to do with whatever is hurting his body rather than him not being able to eat or drink the way it is with nausea, because he eats so hungrily when he eats. so, i think it should be ok for me to give him water with a syringe. Before these symptoms started, i was giving him probiotics mixed in water in syringe and he liked it, he drank it right from the syringe, he didn't try to resist.
 
Hi~

I have to be honest with you, after reading this whole strain....Id go see another vet or your vet again as soon as possible~ I can tell your scared and that you love your dog, but it just sounds like this might be something serious and I personally wouldnt take any chances. I dont know much when it comes to sick dogs, but if hes acting so out of charactor...id just bring him in again.
 
Judy - I am really concerned for your baby. You need to raise holy heck and get in to see the vet immediately. If your normal vet clinic doesn't think it is serious, then you have to go elsewhere and fast. With all the symptoms you mention, it sounds like your like guy is really suffering. I am glad to hear there are vets open on Sunday too. You must be exhausted and so full of anxiety.

It does sound like an allergic reaction, with the bumps and all. I know nothing about SM, so I can't offer an opinion there. You mentioned going to get children's benedryl, but I don't recall reading whether that helped?
 
he wasn't any better after the benadryl.

i spoke to the vet, she said the blood tests weren't back yet, hopefully this afternoon, not much to do until the results are available.
he's not worse today. i thought he might be a little better, he ate a little kibble which he hadn't done the past two days, only canned. he did not want to go outside but i tempted him with a toy and then he peed a decent amount of pee and had a normal looking stool.

but otherwise he is just laying around and sleeping today. He's not scratching or digging into the pillows much or licking his paws, but right now i'm watching hin, he's taking his front paw and rubbing it on his nose, right in the places where those bumps are. so that seems to be a good possible explanation of the scratching, including an explanation for why he seemed to want to scratch in many differnet places, including the back of his neck and chest where he also has lesions. He probably has others too, they're not easy to see. But the vet looked carefully between his toes and didn't see anything so it wouldn't explain that, unless he's doing it reflexively.

on the phone, i asked the vet about the lesions, she didn't see them yesterday, said probably allergy, probably not related to the other stuff. i can't help thinking it's in some way related, but she mainly wanted to see the blood results before saying much more about it. I brought up the thing about garlic and hemolytic anemia and she acknowledged that possibility, just need to see the blood results. I sure hope she calls back about it today, i will call before they close. if his bumps are itching, maybe he should have some more benadryl.

I tried to get in to another vet but it was too late. I made an appointment for tomorrow.

i want to do everything possible for him. At the same time, i don't want to do stuff that's unnecessary. She was trying to influence me against getting the bloodwork yesterday, said he just recently had had bloodwork and it probably wouldn't show anything. I'm glad i told her to do it anyway, even if it doesn't show anything.
 
karlin said:
If he was bitten by something that could explain some of these symptoms. An allergy would not explain the fact that he is finding it hard to walk or eliminate.

SM could explain all the things you were seeing but so could other things. Given the high incidence in the breed, an MRI is almost certainly going to show SM in probably a minimum of half of all cavaliers anyway, and the malformation that causes it in about 90%, as now two studies and numerous screening programmes are consistently showing. So the issue is probably not whether he has conditions that are part of SM or the causes of SM, but whether these things in particular are clinical signs rather than something else as clearly, a lot of dogs have SM without showing clinical signs or showing only very mild signs.

It is a very complex area with no easy answers or solutions.

Indeed. It reminds me of what i encountered in researching back pain after i got hit by a car as a pedestrian last year. You can get an MRI and it may show what will be called a ruptured disk, but research has shown that a large proportion of people with ruptured disk on MRI are asymptomatic--they have no pain. So getting an MRI doesn't necessarily answer the question of what's causing the pain. You can have an MRI that shows a ruptured disk, but it doesn't necessarily mean the ruptured disk is causing the pain. It might be a muscle spasm. It's frustrating because there's no way to know whether disk surgery will really correct the pain. sometimes it does, sometimes it doesn't. pretty invasive procedure for trial and error.

the more i think about it, the location of the bumps would really explain the ways he's been rubbing his head and face, and the way he's been scratching.

Hey! i think he's getting better! He had been laying and sleeping in the same place all day when a few minutes ago a squirrel showed up in the backyard and the cat went running to the door, and zack slowly got up and joined her. he went out the door and then did one of his normal leaps straight up against the fence, trying to get to the squirrel up in the tree. His running looked normal, his leap sure looked normal, didn't seem to hurt him, although dogs don't show pain that much when something is wrong, but what seemed improved was, he continued to be interested in the squirrel, and then after it left, he played fetch with me until i got tired of it, he was pulling strongly on the toy for tug o war, he was doing his play growl. He hasn't done this in over two days.

well, i sure am encouraged by that.

I just found another lesion, above his eyebrow about an inch. These are definitely the places he's been rubbing and scratching.
 
Judy i hope Zack feels better...They only time King went a whole day w/o eliminating was the time King spent the weekend @ a friend's while the family and i went on vacation...but vet said it was prob cuz he was stressed not that he wan't feelin good....just 1 ques the fluid they injected him wit was it subQ meanin did they inject under the skin most likely @ his shoulders....cuz my bosses dog needed that when he was a pup cuz he went hypoglycemic and needed fluids
 
I'm glad to hear he's getting better, and will see the vet tomorrow. :xfngr: We're keeping our fingers crossed that he will continue to improve and that he has a good appointment. :flwr:
 
:) zack is definitely improving now. He is not 100% but definitelly better, more energy, still resting and sleeping a lot, didn't get excited or want to come with me when i went out, even though i picked up his harness from the table, which normally gets him to come over to have it put on him.

i ran into a couple of old friends i haven't seen in years when i was out and they told me about a lady at a pet store in the neighborhood, they said she was a healer. I went over there and talked to her. She asked if i could bring zack for her to see (she said she is not a healer, she just knows some things), so i went back and got zack and she said it looked like ant bites. I do have little black ants in the backyard, i didnt' know they were a biting threat, in my whole life i've never been bitten by one, though they are common. i bought some stuff from her to spray on the lesions, it's called PetSolution RX and it's just water, it says it's electrolized oxidizing water, no other ingredients. She said it would relieve itching. She said she uses it on herself too.

then we went to the pet supply store for stuff and he acted normally there, maybe a bit quieter than usual but he seemed to enjoy himself. his energy is increasing clearly.

when we got home he went and emptied his bowl of kibble that was sitting there, there wasn't that much. The lady at the pet store had given me a sample of Innova Evo to try so i gave him that and he at a lot of it. I gave him some canned food, canadae, mixed with a little of the Evo kibble. he ate it all.

He's been taking it easy but definitely is better than he was for the last couple of day. whew.

The lesions on his face are changing color, becoming more pink and the skin around them is more pink than yesterday, not just the bumps but all around his lips. When i first saw them around his mouth last night, i wasn't even sure if anything was abnormal, it was just faint pink. It looks like he got into something and was eating something that was an irritant of some kind. But there are other bumps away from his mouth, over his eyebrow, on the back of his neck, on his chest, under his jaw. I sprayed the stuff on them and he seemed to like that. He hasn't scratched or rubbed since. It bothers him to have the bumps touched. I think they are related to the other symptoms he's been having. i sure hope he's going to be ok now.

The vet never called back with the blood panel results. i'll call tomorrow. I have an appointment with a different vet tomorrow to get the lesions looked at.

i can't thank everybody who responded enough for your caring words and for letting me talk about this ordeal.
 
today zack's energy level and personality seem pretty much normal, whew, yay. he's still rubbing his face a little, licking paws and scratching, sleeping, but back to normal playful and social behavior, and his usual interests.

the lesions on the skin have begun to shrink and the dark pinkness is fading. still kind of crusty. I've been spraying the stuff i got on them, seems to soothe him, the lady said that complete healing would result in two days.

I have a vet appointment at 2pm just to have the lesions looked at. the other vet didn't call today with the lab results so i called and was told the lab hasn't entered them on the website yet. I said the other vet i was seeing at 2pm had asked the results be faxed to them so she called the lab and said they would send everything except a thyroid test that takes 24 to 48 hours that they don't have. sounds like they didn't get around to this test until yesterday, i was told it's the holiday weekend, they're probably short staffed. I don't care, i wish the doctor had written STAT on it but i doubt she did, she generally advised against getting the blood panel, said it was unlikely to show anything. i'm not pleased that it wasn't treated as urgent, for $180 freaking dollars, and my dog not eating or drinking and unwilling or unable to stand up.

i'm just glad zack seems to be recovering.

If the second vet says it looks like insect bites, i'm going to ask the first vet to document that for when i file an insurance claim. not looking forward to that ordeal.

i am worried about zack getting bitten by the same kind of insects again. I need to figure out how to prevent that.

I am wondering if what he has had would be considered an allergic reaction to bites, or if it would be considered a nonallergic toxic condition, a poisoning--if there's a difference between the two. My reading on the web has left me confused about it. If it was allergic, then would it be wise to have him get some kind of desensitization treatment? i'll ask the vet today.

although i'm not thinking that the neem oil or garlic caused what he's been going through now, after his lesions heal, i'm going to get advantage or frontline plus for fleas for him, if the fleas become a problem, which, knock on wood, they haven't yet.
 
Judy that PetSolution RX really works great doesn't it...i kinda 4got bout it cuz i have it 4 King...i use it anytime he feels a lil itchy or scratches sometimes....This woman ur talking bout kinda sounds like my boss....cuz she says she uses the PetSolution RX on herself too...i would not try it myself...but thats just me....if they r ant or someother insect bites, mayb u might wanna think about spraying ur backyard so he doesn't get bitten again.....but so glad to hear Zack is feelin better :D yay!!!
 
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