Am I paranoid.?

I know it is early days with Bella but here are a couple of concerns I have:

- When she sits her right front leg twitches/shakes.
- She scratches at her neck a lot (she does have a collar though which may annoy her)
- When she shakes hands she becomes off-balance (is this just because she is a puppy and is still working out the whole balance thing?
- When I stroke her side near her back leg she does the scratching motion. (My parents dog does this)

Then I look at research on SM and these are symptoms.

She also coughs (a dry cough) sometimes after drinking/eating etc.

I also had the same concerns with our pup, who is now 5 months old. He displayed all the same concerns that you've just posted,
apart from being off balance, and I was fearful that they may have been early signs of SM as well.
Where they very well might be, we tried taking his collar off and just put his harness on when going for walks, and that has stopped the
neck scratching and also noticed that only when he's thirsty and had a BIG drink, does he cough (more than likely from drinking too fast).

His leg also trembles when he sits on his side, but I noticed that by side sitting, his front leg was barely making contact with the
ground, so it would twitch until he shifted his weight. But I had exactly the same fears, where Jessie hasn't been tested, after
seeking advice from the lovely members here, I began to look at the symptoms without that nagging fear and realised that there was
a more logical explanation for most of them.

If you have a look here, you can see the replies http://www.cavaliertalk.com/forums/...bout-having-my-puppy-tested-for-Syringomyelia and please try not to worry, easier said than done, I know. Maybe start by removing her collar
and see if that makes any difference.

Sorry that your having to worry about it :hug:

Thank you! I took off her collar for a few hours and she did stop scratching. After a few hours I put it back on and she started again.

Alana - there is so much to watch for, with the Cavs, that I tend to over react to a lot of things, too. At the end of the day, I figured out (through trial and error) that Sophie scratches at her ears and neck only when she is fed kibble and a raw diet with any kind of carbohydrates , so we keep to a carbohydrate-free raw diet. It's a real bother, but it works. It is good to keep an eye on our dogs, but also to experiment if there is another cause. Hopefully the collar is it. Check the inside for any raw edges and such. Sophie had a popular-brand step-in harness as a pup, but the raw ends of the webbing were annoying her and THAT scratching stopped when we went back to a collar. It's all trial-and-error and hoping for the best.

Thank you!

Hate to bug, but have you picked up insurance on your pup? It would be advisable. Considering all the issues with Cav's, and I personally wouldn't want to mention anything to the Vet until you've got it in place and passed the 30 period.

Even allergies can be expensive in the long haul.

Do try to relax and enjoy your pup! They are so fantastic.