More Information

One of the tests they did at the vet school showed that one of the chambers in Reyna’s heart is enlarged and one of her valves is a bit leaky. The vet said he couldn’t hear a murmur, so he doesn’t think its going to be a problem for her for a long time, if ever. He did say its something to be checked at each yearly, and if she gets to a point where the vet can hear a murmur, it should be looked at again. Or if her activity level suddenly drops drastically, her heart would be the best place to start testing.

Oh, and the shaving wasn’t for the MRI, but for the spinal tap. Which makes more sense, really.

Reyna’s getting 90 mg of Pb, twice a day. That’s a pill and a half each time, which sucks, because the pills aren’t scored, and they’re stinking hard to cut exactly in half. When I get her refill in a month, I’m going to ask for 30 mg or 90 mg pills, so that I don’t have to stress over whether or not I’m over or under-dosing her.

The only reaction I’m seeing to the Pb is that she is extremely clumsy. I’m guessing that any normal-energy dog would be snoozing, but when has she ever been “normal” anything? She’s slipping, sliding, and tripping a lot, but it doesn’t seem to bother her nearly as much as it bothers me... I keep reminding myself that it’ll be a few more days before she gets used to the meds. Until then, I’m giving her the full dose of pain meds, because sooner or later, she’s going to realize that her hips really hurt. Mine hurt just from watching hers slide out from under her. I actually feel bad about having the wood floors. Poor girl. She can’t even catch her ball, because she keeps tripping over her own feet.

Duncan is officially the graceful dog of the house now. Not only can he run without falling (usually), he can also catch the red bouncy ball in mid-air. He’s even been jumping for it, and catching it while all four feet are off the ground. Its really cute, watching him drop the ball so that it bounces and he can catch it again. He doesn’t understand why I’m not letting him play rough with Reyna, though. Part of it is because she doesn’t have the fur on the back of her neck to protect her from his teeth, and part of it is that every time he bumps her, she falls over, and that’s just not a good thing.

Good To Have Her Back

Reyna got to come home this afternoon. Duncan spent some time looking at her like he wasn't sure who she was, but after about 20 minutes, he decided he was thrilled she was home.

I’ll get more into specifics later (if I feel like it), but the main thing is that all her tests came back negative for seizure-causing issues. The vet feels 99% confident that she has epilepsy. There’s a slim chance that it might be some type of movement disorder, but only time will tell. Basically, if she doesn’t respond to the Phenobarbital (Pb), she has a movement disorder. If she does, she has epilepsy. The vet said her liver enzymes look great, so he’s not worried about the combination of Pb and Rimadyl on her liver. He said that he wants her to stay on the Pb for at least a year, and if she hasn’t had any seizures in that year, we can consider stepping down the dose or switching to a more mild anti-convulsant.

Poor Reyna’s a bit clumsy tonight, although the vet was surprised at how non-sedated she was when I picked her up. I wasn’t...I’ve never seen a sedative actually make her sedate. Reyna has a shaved leg, where they put in the IV, and the back of her head is also shaved, for the MRI. I’ll post a picture of that in a day or so. The Pb will possibly have a sedating effect on her, but she should be completely normal within a week. If she isn’t, I’m supposed to take her back to the vet. We also go back in two weeks for blood work, just to make sure her liver is still okay. The Pb might have a few other side effects, but they’re all pretty mild, as long as I keep an eye on her. And the meds are fairly strict...they need to be as close to 12 hours apart as possible. Once they’re totally in her system, messing with the timing or amount could actually spark a seizure. I’ve got a call in to the Dermatology department at the vet school for an appointment with them, to try and narrow down the allergy/auto immune issue.

Okay...time to go. Reyna just plowed into the wall... Spinning while on drugs is clearly not a safe activity...

Reyna

Reyna is still at the vet school emergency clinic, and will be there until at least Monday afternoon. The vet said she’s being very friendly and loving with everyone, as long as they don’t try to take her temperature. He also said that her blood work came back clean, and that they were planning to run a few more tests today. The main reason he kept her there, though, is because they started her on the Phenobarbital, and he wanted to be able to monitor her response to it. Tomorrow, he’s going to have a vet from Dermatology come in and discuss the different possibilities and tests for her allergies and auto immune issues, and they’re going to run some more tests and do an MRI and possibly a spinal tap in the afternoon. Fingers crossed that those will all come back clean, and she can come on home. If none of the tests show anything, and she responds well to the Phenobarb, then they’ll call it epilepsy, and she’ll most likely be on anti-convulsants for the rest of her life.

Baby Birds

So, here's a pic of the babies taken on Saturday, the 16th. They're starting to show a bit more fluff (not to mention some actual physical features).



And here's one of Mom (or Dad, I can't tell) delivering a snack.



And this one was taken Sunday morning. The babies are definitly growing up. And apparently upset that they aren't getting fed while I'm standing there taking pictures....

Another Year

Happy birthday, Loki! Hope to have many more!

Not A Good Day

Reyna is spending the night at the vet school emergency hospital. Shortly after 2:00pm today, she had five seizures in a row, barely managing to come completely out of one before the next started. She had another seizure at 5:10, and the seventh at 5:15. The last one was different from the rest, in that she was laying completely on her side, but her head was twisted around so that her chin was on the floor. It even woke up Duncan. In fact, that’s how I knew she was having one. I was in the kitchen, and I heard Duncan move really quick. When I turned to look at him, he was staring at Reyna with a “What the crap are you doing?!?” look on his face. I called the vet school emergency clinic, told them what was happening, and they told me to bring her in. So I did.

The vet said that her seizures are definitely facial focal (partial) seizures. He also said that seven in three hours is very bad, and the fact the she was contorting somewhat on the last one is even worse. They ran a bunch of blood work tonight, and called me about 9:45 tonight to tell me that those tests came back okay, and that the neurologist has started her on Phenobarbital, and will give her another dose in the morning. I’d mentioned my regular vet’s concern about combining the Pheno and her hip meds, and the response was that most dogs do fine on both, but if she has trouble, the Pheno is more important, and they’ll find her a new pain killer. The neurologist will officially be assigned her case tomorrow morning, and is supposed to call me between 8:00 and 10:00 to tell me what’s happening. Depending on the tests they decide to run tomorrow, she may be able to come home and then go back in Monday morning, or she might have to stay there until sometime Monday. It just depends on what they find. The vet who saw her tonight said he’s pretty sure its epilepsy, but they have to rule out the other possibilities before they can say that with any real certainty. So now we wait and see.

Life

They've hatched! The baby birds are alive and (I assume) well. I'm so excited! I'm an aunt! Or a god-mother! Or something along those lines, anyway. This morning, I got to see the parent birds bringing in food for the babies. One adult would fly in with food, the other would take it and disappear into the nest. I'm really looking forward to tracking their progress, so get used to seeing updates!

Even The Best Option Isn’t A Good One

I spoke with the vet Monday, and was able to email him the clip of Reyna’s seizure (which is here, if you’re interested in seeing it). He said that it looks like a pretty classic partial seizure, which is definitely better than a grand mal seizure. The vet seems to think its most likely canine epilepsy, although he did say that the second most likely option is a brain tumor. He told me about a few other potential causes, but said that, based on her breed, history, and most recent blood work, he feels comfortable ruling out those other options. The bad part is that there is no test for epilepsy – instead, it becomes the default diagnosis after everything else has been ruled out. And all those other tests could run about $3,000. Since he’s saying there are really only two possibilities, I’m leaning towards having a test done just to rule out the brain tumor. And then I’ll feel better about calling it epilepsy.

For now, the vet wants to treat her with benign neglect. In other words, he wants me to watch her for a few more days, and let him know on Monday how many more seizures she’s had. I really wish there were some way for her to tell me if she’s having any while I’m at work. She had three on Saturday, and that makes me worry about what might be happening when I’m not home. If we get really lucky, this will turn out to be a phase that she’ll cycle through, like she did last fall. No way to know when they might start back again, of course. And that’s probably what bothers me the most...I really want to know what’s triggering these. Since I haven’t been out of town in a month, I think its pretty safe to say its not stress over me traveling.

If she doesn’t stop having the seizures fairly soon, the vet said there’s a couple of medicine options. The best is Phenobarbital, but she can’t have that. It processes through the liver, and the pain meds she’s on for her hips also process through the liver. Adding the Phenolbarb would basically destroy her liver, which really isn’t a good thing. And the pain meds are doing a good job, so we don’t want to change those out for something new unless we really have to. The second option is potassium bromide, but that takes 30 to 45 days to get in her system. So, if we start her on that now, and the seizures stop, we’ll never really know if they stopped because it was a phase or if the meds did their job. And we really don’t want to keep popping her on and off of meds, especially when they take so long to get in and out of her system.

I just keep thinking that her allergies, her auto immune issues, her OCD, and now these seizures, are all in some way connected. Because I know she just doesn’t wake up in the morning and decide to eat her tail. Something sparks it, but I don’t know what. The vet does a great job of treating the symptoms, but we haven’t found the root cause of her problems. I asked the vet about it, and he said that modern medicine would say no, these aren’t connected, but that Chinese medicine would say yes, of course they are. Anyone know a good vet trained in Chinese medicine?

My Poor Girl

I was finally able to tape one of Reyna's seizures tonight. She had three today, and the most recent one lasted long enough for me to get the camera up and running. I left a message this morning for the vet to call me on Monday, and with luck, he'll have some time early this week for me to show him the video clip. If he doesn't have any ideas, I'm going to try for an appointment at the vet school. When Reyna was having these last fall, she was having three or four a week - that I saw, anyway. But I've seen six so far this week, including the three today, and that really worries me about how many she might be having when I'm not home. Fingers crossed that the video helps the vet diagnose the problem.

Just as a side note, the idiot who called Reyna "dangerous" two weeks ago suggested today that maybe Reyna had a seizure during class and thats why she "attacked" the sheltie. And then she suggested I might want to think about putting Reyna down before her illness causes her to start attacking people. She's lucky I didn't show her how dangerous Reyna's mom can be.....

They're Baaaaaaaack

Poor Reyna. The seizures she had last fall, that went away in October? Well, they've come back. She had one Tuesday, and two last night. The frequency makes me worry about what might be going on when I'm not home. Now, if I can just catch one on video, I can take it to the vet for him to assess. Not that I want her to have any more, but if she is, I'd appreciate it if she'd have one that lasted long enough for me to film. I've started carrying my digital camera around with me, just in case...

Fireflies and Baby Birds

Last night was the first night that the fireflies were really showing off, and Duncan was completely fascinated. He wasn’t even interested in playing with Reyna or his jolly ball. Instead, he would follow a firefly around until he was distracted by another one lighting up nearby. Then he’d follow that one til he was distracted by yet another one. He also kept opening his mouth, almost like he was going to snap at one and try to eat it, but it was all in slow motion, more of a curious action than anything else. And he never got close enough to one to actually get it in his mouth, even if that had been his intention. I caught a couple and showed them to him, and he just stared at them until they flew away. It was really cute, watching him walk around with that rapt expression on his face.

In totally unrelated news, a bird has nested in my hanging geranium, and there are five eggs in the nest. Thankfully, no one has successfully nested in my dryer vent this year. The mama bird and I have come to an agreement. She leaves the nest when I need to water the plant, and I don’t try and take pictures of her while she’s in the nest. She seems to be somewhat camera shy...

A New Surprise Every Day

A couple of weeks ago, I came home to find the remnants of a stuffed dog toy scattered around the deck and yard. As the days – and the toy – passed, I found even more pieces. Enough to be surprised at how much stuffing is sown into those things. I hadn’t given the toy to the dogs, so I figured Duncan had stashed it in his hidey-hole under the deck a couple of months ago. Turns out, I was wrong.

This morning, Reyna decided she was tired of waiting on me to throw her ball, so she walked onto the deck and proceeded to open the “secure” toy chest I keep there. After rooting around for a minute, her head popped out of the chest with a toy in her mouth, and the chest closed as she pulled her head away from it. She and Duncan then had a grand time playing tug with the toy, while I stood and watched, surprised yet again at the extremely nonchalant manner in which Reyna continues to display her amazing intelligence.

Happy Birthday, Belle!

Belle turned 10 on the 23rd (so I’m not too awful late with this). It amazes me that she’s been part of my life for just a couple months shy of an entire decade. Thankfully, the antibiotics the vet gave her knocked out whatever nasty cold/infection she picked up earlier this year. She’s back to her normal, sweet self. Of course, as I type this, I have two nice scratches on my cheek. She nailed me last night in her haste to get away from Loki, who had the nerve to encroach upon her space as she was snuggled next to me.

Sweet Freedom

The misery is over – for 29 days, anyway. And then my next class starts. But until then, I’ll do my best to actually catch up with everything. Including, but not limited to, blogs, house cleaning, yard work, reading, and cross-stitching. During the 29 days I have a 4 day freestyle seminar in Virginia and a 3 day business trip to Dallas. So much to do, and so little time to do it. As usual.

Buried Treasure

I gave the pups soup bones last night – this is one of their favorite treats, and it actually takes a couple of hours for them to finish, so I get a bit of time to get things done. Everyone’s happy. Normally, I’ll put out at least three, because Reyna will choose one, then Duncan picks one, then Reyna takes Duncan’s, so Duncan gets the third one (because he wouldn’t dare take the one Reyna had been chewing), then Reyna takes Duncan’s new one, Duncan takes Reyna’s original bone, and the cycle continues. Occasionally, Duncan will take one outside and hide it first, then come in and pick one to chew, and then the swapping cycle starts. Last night, though, was a bit different.

There were three bones, and before Duncan even got close to them, Reyna put one behind the chair, one on the couch next to me (indicating she would come back to that one), and then started looking for a place to bury the third bone. She tried to bury it in the ottoman first, but figured out pretty quickly that the hole she was trying to dig wasn’t actually getting any deeper. So she went to the chair and proceeded to dig a “hole” between the seat cushion and the back of the chair. And that’s where she buried her bone. She seemed very proud of herself, too.

Thankfully, it was only in there about an hour before she decided she’d rather chew on it than one of the other ones. I can just imagine the stink if I’d forgotten about it and she’d left it in there indefinitely. After all, these bones are uncooked, and generally still have meat on them...

USECO

I don’t think I’ve ever talked about work on here before, but this deserves it. I’ve finally completed something. The four classes I took at the end of last year and start of this year were done in late February. I had a four hour exam March 14. Think SAT. A number 2 pencil, bubbles that had to be filled in completely, four sections of 50 questions and 60 minutes, with someone proctoring the whole thing. Thankfully, I was allowed to use my ITAR and EAR CFRs (books with the export regulations). But I made it through all of that, and I passed the exam. I am a certified United States Export Compliance Officer, which basically means I have something else to put on my resume, and I can put a string of initials behind my name on my business cards. And I’d darn well better get a raise out of it.

Big D, the Demo Dog

Duncan has become quite the popular fellow lately. He did a short tricks/moves demo for the German Shepherd Dog Club last month, and they asked him to demo again last night so they could take pictures of him. I think they just like laughing while he takes his time doing his sits, downs, spins, etc. It’s a good thing I didn’t name him Lightning. The club asked me last night if Duncan would be willing to do a freestyle demo for them next month. I don’t see any reason why he couldn’t Hakuna Matata for them, especially since I’ll have hot dogs.

On March 24, he demoed his routine (sort of) at a dog event in Greenville, NC. Considering it was his first public performance, and there were about 100 dogs and people watching, and there was all sorts of neat stuff on the stage, he did very well. The only real problem he had was that he kept looking back towards the room where Reyna was waiting, and as we were doing our walk-off, he bolted to Reyna. I had to take him back out on the stage for him to bow to everyone. So what did we learn? If Duncan is doing anything that requires he give me his attention, Reyna can’t be where he can see or hear her. But that’s okay. Because that’s something I can work around.

She Makes Me Feel So Old...

Its so hard to believe that Belle will be 10 years old in just a couple of weeks. I remember Sam and I talking about which kitten we wanted while I was still in England, and deciding to take the tortoiseshell tabby, because spots and stripes just sounded so cool. I also remember going to Regina’s house to look at the kittens with Jeff, and laughing at Belle’s poor brother, Earl Grey, who kept running into the closed storm door. I was sooooo tempted to take him, too. I also tossed around the idea of naming Belle Minerva, and calling her Minnie. I’m glad I went with Mirabelle.

As part of the joy that comes with old age – because yes, Belle is technically old – she had blood work done back in January, just to establish a baseline for the vet to refer to if she gets sick later and he needs to check her blood. That sounded like a great idea, up until the vet called to tell me that her white cell count was extremely low, and that that usually meant some type of nasty disease (think FIV or Feline Leukemia). So he did another round of tests, which came back negative. I took her back a month later for a follow-up test, to see if the first test had been a fluke. It wasn’t. Her white cell count wasn’t quite as low as the first time, but it was still well below the low end of the acceptable range. At that point, the options were pretty much do nothing but wait, or do a bone aspiration and run tests on her bone marrow. Because things like leukemia and bone cancer may hide from the blood tests, but can’t from the marrow tests. Of course, there was also the chance that the bone marrow test wouldn’t show anything, and then we’d be back where we started, except I’d be poorer. And Belle would be madder. The vet passed her paperwork on to a specialist to get another opinion, which was nice of him. The specialist recommended holding off on the bone aspiration, since Belle wasn’t acting sick, but to keep a close eye on her, and if she started feeling bad, to get her back to the vet. That sounded like a good plan, up until about a week ago….

About a month ago, Khar’pern caught a cold, and had sneezing fits and runny eyes for a bit over a week. Then Per’la started sneezing, and a few days later, Khar was fine. So Per’la had sneezing fits and runny eyes for several days. I didn’t even bother considering a trip to the vet, since there’s really nothing he could have done but tell me she had a cold, and I already knew that. But then Belle started sneezing. And a few days later, Per’la was fine. Belle’s been sneezing for a couple of weeks now, and isn’t showing signs of getting better. Parm started sneezing last week, but he got over it in a couple of days, but Belle defied the pattern and stayed sick. I talked to the vet about it Monday (when we were discussing Reyna’s current conditions), and told him I was only mentioning it because of the low white cell count. Unfortunately, he agreed that it could be a problem. Most of these colds are supposed to run 7-10 days, and then be gone. But there’s the possibility that Belle’s low white count means she can’t fight it off like the others can. So, I’ll keep an eye on her for a few more days, and then call the vet back next Monday if she isn’t better. The poor girl, she’ll sneeze 10 times in a row, and her eyes look like she’s crying almost constantly. And she’s permanently pissed right now. If one of the other cats even looks at her funny, much less dares to walk near her, she starts hissing and growling. I hate it when my baby doesn’t feel good and there’s nothing I can do about it.

Party Girl

Reyna celebrated her third birthday on Saturday. She got to have a cake from Gourmutt’s Bakery – which she very generously shared with Duncan.

Cadaver Dirt Smells Yummy!

Reyna and I are back in Search and Rescue training with Donny, the same guy we originally trained with when Reyna was a pup. The last time we signed up for this, I hurt my back the day before the first session. Thankfully, that did not happen this time. Donny calls us his two cripples and his walking wounded, so he’s making a point of keeping our searches physically easier than they used to be. In fact, Reyna now only gets one standard search during each practice. I hate to admit it, but its probably a good thing. Reyna is still having some trouble with her hips, even with the new pain meds. And I feel it in my back every time we run a track.

Since we’re not letting Reyna work as much physically, we’ve decided to work that scary-smart brain of hers instead. She started training for cadaver searches a couple of weeks ago. Donny gave me a bottle with some cadaver dirt (yes, that’s dirt taken from around/underneath a dead and decomposed person) so that we can practice at home. Its teaching Reyna the scent she’s supposed to be hunting, since I can’t exactly give her a scent article that smells like a cadaver every time we start working. Basically, I just hide the open bottle, run her through the area telling her to “seek”, and when she finds the bottle, she gets heaps of praise. She hasn’t quite decided that looking for cadaver dirt is as exciting as looking for a live person, since the live person also gives her loads of praise, and the bottle just sits there. So I have to be really goofy about it, and make it as fun and rewarding as possible. She did better yesterday than she’s done recently, so I think its starting to click for her. Thankfully, cadaver work doesn’t exclude her from being able to look from live people, since that’s a different command. We “find” live people, but we “seek” for the dead. A simple distinction, but all-important in doggy vocabulary.

There is one drawback to being goofy...Reyna nailed me right below my nose with the top of her head yesterday. Now every time I blow my nose (which is a lot, thanks to this stupid cold), the sore spot makes itself known. Of course, I’m lucky she didn’t hit me any higher...she could easily have broken my nose, as hard as she hit it.