We interrupt this training program...

This post has little to do with triathlon. It's more of a public declaration, to assuage my guilt, of my excuse for having missed so many workouts lately. (All but one this week, and almost as bad last week.) My work and my workout schedule have been seriously derailed in the past two weeks because of my darling dog, who I love dearly and would do just about anything for. But at the moment, she's doing her best to test the boundaries of that commitment.

Two pieces of information will help put this into context:
1)I am an almost fanatical animal lover. I went back to school for a BS in Biological Sciences with the intent of going on to vet school (my health and finances killed that plan). I have worked as a vet tech and have been extremely active in a local breed rescue program. When I get a pet, I am totally committed to giving it the best care possible, no matter what. I've noticed the problem ones tend to find me, maybe because nobody else wants them, or maybe because the powers that be know I can handle it. Oh, and the vet in the following scenario is where I used to work and I completely trust them.

2) I left a cushy corporate job almost a year ago to start a career as a professional writer. As with any new business, money has been squeaky tight - this year was the equivalent of a 90% pay cut. I met every milestone a first-year writer could expect to meet and business is clearly picking up. However, for now money is incredibly tight, and we'd already decided not to exchange Christmas gifts with our nearest and dearest when this little doggy drama started.

That's Karma on the right. On the left is Sable, my 8 year old Golden mix, who never causes any trouble.

On Sunday, it will have been 2 weeks since my husband woke me at 6am with "Karma's puking aluminum foil." Fantastic. I was kicking myself - when I threw out the greasy foil from the broiler pan I had even remembered to put the garbage can in the pantry (our newest ploy after they figured out how to knock the can of baked beans off the lid), but the door doesn't always latch well and I clearly screwed that up.

That turned into endless doggy diarrhea, withholding normal food, cooking rice and boiling chicken - anyone with a dog probably knows what I'm talking about. But it didn't get better after a day and a half so we called the vet.

That led to a (discounted to) $40 visit to check her temperature, get some intestinal meds and some prescription bland food (so I didn't have to cook as much).

She finished the first course of intestinal meds with no improvement. That led to a (discounted to) $170 vet visit, which included a full blood workup and a different prescription food and a refill on meds. The bloodwork showed only a slightly elevated hematocrit, which is perfectly acceptable in a dog that's slightly dehydrated after more than a week of diarrhea.

After more than a week of treatment it got worse, not better. Now I couldn't even leave the house because she couldn't go for more than an hour without needing to be let outside. The doctor told me if she hadn't improved by Thursday to call back. I had to be gone for several hours yesterday (thank goodness for good friends with house keys) and by the time I got done with the meetings the vet was closed. I was flipping out, because my dog, the queen of 'eat first, think later' (once at 5 months old she broke into the food and almost ate herself to death), was refusing her dinner. Had to be coaxed to eat a tiny bit this morning. So I called first thing this morning and they had me bring her right in - time to start taking pictures.

Today's vet visit was $316 - that's with over $60 in discounts that my wonderful vet gave me on the very expensive toxin cultures and a just-in-case giardia test (already came back negative). It would have been closer to $500 had I remembered to fast her for breakfast so they could pull blood for a pancreatic enzyme test.

Her x-rays today were "not enlightening." How's that for a definitive diagnosis? I think that will replace my current favorite, which was my doctor telling me in August that my wrist "probably wasn't broken." On the up side, there were no obvious foreign bodies - we were all kind of expecting to see aluminum foil in there. BUT, that doesn't mean she didn't eat something stupid that isn't metal (such as foam chicken packaging) causing the problem. However, based on her symptoms a blockage is not likely.

They're now running a special toxin panel ($225) looking for clostridium, salmonella and something else that eludes me at the moment. (Oh yeah! Campylobacter!) These are heavy duty bacterial infections that would be consistent with a garbage can incident, and if we get a positive hit it will be a definitive diagnosis and we can move on to a more powerful antibiotic and be done. Dr. said two of these are persnickety tests that take time and special cultures, so best case we'll get results on Tuesday.

The vet recommended pretty strongly that we do an ultrasound (at least $270) to try to get a better look at her pancreas. And a special blood test to look at pancreatic enzymes, because if it is pancreatitis (which is highly likely, if not the only factor, at least a contributing one) and it keeps going on like this her enzymes could be depleted. That's another $150 or so. That's the one I forgot to fast her for today. Oh, and that one has to be shipped to the vet school at Texas A&M, and they'll be gone for Christmas, so if we're doing it we have to do it by Tuesday.

Another option, although much lower on the recommendation list because of today's inconclusive xrays, is a barium series. Couple hundred dollars and it might not show a damn thing. So that one's on the back burner.

I'd been wondering if they'd suggest it, and she did bring it up... if we go through all of these tests and nothing pans out and her situation does not improve then we have to talk about exploratory surgery. She's only 5 years old and a happy, healthy dog, so this is a reasonable, if last resort, course of action.

For now the doctor and I decided to proceed with one test at a time because she is still doing relatively well and has not lost any weight. Her attitude is going downhill and she's been sad, mopey and refusing food since yesterday, so we have cause for concern - we didn't think it was possible for Karma to refuse food. If her condition has a precipitous decline in the next couple days then we'll have to rush to do a bunch of the tests all at once to try to find the answer before she gets too sick, and before all the doctors disappear for Christmas.

Oh, and all this happened just a few short weeks after a diagnosis of Pannus (aka German Shepherd Corneal Keratitis) and roughly $350 at the animal eye specialist. If there's a problem that German Shepherds can have, she seems to come up with it (she's also got hip dysplasia, and as I'm learning the hard way, Shepherds are particularly susceptible to pancreatitis from eating stupid things).

The particularly fun part is that, for a dog that will obey us for just about anything, she will not open her mouth to get pilled. She clamps her jaw in a way that would be comical if we didn't need to get the medicine into her. If we hide it in food she eats the food and spits out the pill. Getting these meds in her has meant a bunch of canned food and pinched fingers.

So, let's review:

Dog: Free (looooooong story. let's just say at 8 weeks old her personality issues were already conspicuous. anyway, who could resist those ears?)

Bottle of Resolve Pet Stain Formula to handle the cream-colored carpet accident from this morning: $4

Normal medical regimen:
- Glucosamine once a day (hips) ($85 for a bottle that lasts about 4 months)
- NeoPolyDex eye drops twice a day ($15/month)
- Tacrolimus eye drops twice a day ($40/month)

Meds for this problem:
- Metronidazole twice a day, on 2nd scrip now ($30 a scrip)
- Endosorb three times a day, just finished 3rd scrip ($20 a scrip), think we've given up on this
- Albon once a day ($30 scrip)
- Acidophilus once a day ($9 for a 30 day bottle)
- as of today, adding famotidine (aka Pepcid) twice a day ($15 for a 45 day bottle)
- special prescription food with low fat content to take it easy on her pancreas (~$30 a bag)

Tests:
- blood panel ($100)
- fecal ($20)
- giardia test ($20)
- xrays ($125)
- toxin panel ($225)
- possible pancreatic enzyme test ($150)
- possible ultrasound ($270)

Special f'ing garbage can with dog-proof lid I should have bought when I saw it a couple months ago even though it was $99 and I was broke: priceless.