Seizures

[Celeste]

I had such a scare with my Missie this afternoon. She's a mix of boxer, sheltie and border collie. She's around 8 years old now. She has been having what I suppose now were seizures this last month. I thought it was she hurt her back at first. They must have been very mild, only effecting her equilibrium some. She then lost control of her bladder a couple of times. Of course she does this if she gets overly excited and has held it to long too. She hates to go out in the rain and will hold it for hours in order to avoid that. She also has always been a submissive peepeier all her life. Usually that's only a little drip unless she's been holding it to long. Today it was major. She literally was uncontrolllably rolling on the floor and thrashing. She kept this up for like 10-15 minutes. At the ending of it, she was having trouble with swallowing and her tongue and mouth looked a bit puffy or something. I kept trying to keep her on her side or stomache without straining on her to much. Or I just held her in my arms. She's medium sized dog and has strong muscles. I'm sure I scared her a couple of times with getting a little to loud with telling her to stop it until I realized she probably couldn't control what she was doing. Finally she started to calm and I talked calmly to her until she was able to remain quiet and still in a stomache lying position. I wouldn't let her move until I was sure she was over it. She lose some control of her bowels at one point in it too. It took her around 30 to 40 minutes before she could manage to walk at all and then she wanted to go outside. She had to move her bowels and pee afterwards and it was hard for her to get down the stairs(we live on the second floor of our apartment building. She had a normal bowel movement and peed just fine. Then she couldn't get back up the stairs by herself. My husband had to carry her up. She did drool and throw up after moving her bowels and peeing. Around 3 hours later she started to act fairly normal again and now 5 hours after she seems almost completely over it except being very tired. Her appetite is normal and she has been drinking water normally. Oh she was able to make it down and up the stairs just fine a couple of hours ago. It's 7:16pm now. It all started at 2:15pm.

I've called around to couple of vets and since we are now on a limited income, we are going to have to wait a bit and think about how to go about getting any treatment she may need. I researched and found out that primidone is used for seizures and it will probably run us $20 a month for it from online resources. Don't know how we're going to do this. We've had her since she was a puppy. The SPCA says all they can do is euthanize her for $35.

I'm wondering if the peanuts she's been getting for treats may have brought it on so severely. The peanuts have a toffee covering that has soy lecithin in it. I also wonder if there's some herbal treatments that would work for her too. The vet will want a third of the payment on the visit day and then I guess will charge our credit card which we just got. That is limited to $250 and we haven't paid down the finance charge on the darn thing yet so it really is limited to around $50 until we can do that. It's one of those that is suppose to help build your credit standing back up. I was really sceptical about agreeing to it.

Anyway, I'm stil a bit shaken from the ordeal and Missie is laying in my chair giving me those questioning eyes. She's tired yet seems reluctant to go into a deep sleep. She keeps having to open her eyes and check if we're still here. She slept for a little while in my husbands arms a while ago. Well she had enough of my chair and is back in "Daddy's" arms again.

[Love Bird B]

Celeste, I hope you can save poor Missie and not take her to the SPCA. What a sad situation. Have you tried to work out a payment plan with a vet to get her the attention she needs? Please keep us posted on how it all works out.

[Celeste]

She is doing pretty well now. She's been sleeping a lot since 7 or 8pm. She is clinging to hubby. Sleeping in his arms in the recliner. She likes to sit next to him like a little human and sleep with her head on his chest or leaning off to the other side on his arm. She drank a bit of water around 9pm. She ate some rice chex with me too and a couple of bites of corn and a little piece of cheese. She seems to have no interest in dogfood just yet. She went out with me at 12:45am and went down to pee. Had a little trouble getting back up the stairs, not to bad though. Then she strutted around the terrace up here and barked at some arrogant cat sitting on the wall down by the road. That's more like her normal self.

She loves mock fighting. She seems to be inspecting all the places she was outside after the incident. I think she's trying to piece together what the heck happened to her. She's a very smart dog. She has a large variety of words that she understands as cues to different activities and foods. Darn dog listens to our conversations and picks those words out of the midst of what we are saying. About the only thing I've never been able to get her to do is roll over without being cued with touches to guide her and she hates to do it. She cracked us up during our travels when we moved a couple of times. She became quite the road trip dog. Loved the motels. She'd get in there and inspect the beds first thing. Make sure she knew which door was ours. She does well with remaining with me off leash. Very obedient dog so long as she knows she will lose her collar if she's not. Suffice to say we love her.

[Love Bird B]

Missey sounds like the perfect companion!

[MariaRosa]

Hi Celeste.....read your post and I'm concerned for your furbaby! 10-15 minutes is a very long time for Missie to be seizing. I think that when a dog undergoes such a long seizure it can cause neurological damage, and this may be why your Missie is having some trouble navigating those stairs.
My Bootsie has had seizures since she was a puppy. (She's 13 now). Whenever a seizure begins, she makes a mad dash for wherever it is that I am, and her little legs will crumble underneath of her as she loses control of them. Once she reaches me, she lays beside me and shivers as if she's super cold, and this lasted about a minute. A few years ago, the seizures worsened in length and intensity. It would start the same, but her little leg would contort painfully, and her mouth would open up all the way in pain. I assume that the swelled look around Missies mouth may have been caused from biting her tongue during that seizure. If it hurts her, you may want to offer her some ice chips...may help numb it up some so it hurts less. Sounds like Missie had a grand mal seizure, which is pretty severe and real scary to watch. Boots began having "cluster seizures" (she'd have a seizing episode, then another would follow about 20, minutes later).

When Bootsie has a seizure, I go to her and lay beside her. You might try keeping throw pillows nearby where you normally sit, and if she starts to seize put them on both sides of her. I know it's scary to watch, but do your best to remain calm, as Missie will need that. You're right about how she cannot control the seizures. They are confusing and frightening to her, and she needs you to be beside her to speak calmly and comfortingly to her while she's going through it. It sometimes helps also, if you can have someone dim the lights and turn down background noises so Missie can concentrate on your calming voice speaking to her.

Like Missie, Bootsie is dazed after a seizure. I usually keep her laying down for about ten minutes to rest, then gently encourage her to try and get up. She is usually ok then.

Missie, however, really needs medical attention. She needs to be on anti-seizure meds. If I were you, I'd call every single veterinarian office I could in the state, explain the situation, and ask if they have any kind of low-cost program that you could participate in. Possibly they could even contact Missies vet and even allow you to then bypass being seen in their office for an appointment. If you didn't have luck w/this, I'd call the closest Veterinary college in your area or Universities that have programs in vet. medicine. Tell them everything. I bet you could uncover something.....I really don't want to see you go the $35 route, Celeste. I'm going to check online and try to see if I can't help you with this.

I'll be back.... Love Paula
PS, Give Missie a ((((((((hug))))))))))) from Bootsie!

[Celeste]

Oh Paula, thank you. The veterinary college thing is something I'm thinking of trying out next. I think I'll have more luck searching online though. The SPCA gave me 2 vets names that will work with you. Still it will be $32 plus whatever extra they charge if it turns into more than just an office exam. Then the medicine I found online will probably run $20 a month. Of course that would be if they put her on the 250mg dose. That neurological damage thing sounds about right. Though it looks like it was very temporary. She's navigating the stairs pretty well today, even ran up them tonight. She's been doing well today. There was only a few minutes this afternoon that she seemed to be getting excited and anxious. It was right around the same time of the day that she had the seizure yesterday. I spent some time sitting by her and petting her and talking calmly to her and reassuring her. She calmed down and seemed fine once the afternoon waned some. I think she actually was afraid it all might happen again. She's eating normally and drinking normal and all.

Funny you mention that thing about your Bootsie acting cold. Missie has been doing that for the last 3 or 4 months on and off. She's had trouble with being stiff too. We keep thinking it's maybe arthritis, yet that does seem a little too soon at 8 years old. I wonder if she's been having some very mild ones all along. My hubby wasn't confused by what was happening when he saw her in the seizure because he had a dog who went through that when he was younger. He said they put his Sparky on dilantin for them. I actually hate to think of her having to be on meds. Sometimes the meds can cause damage as well. This is the first time she's had such a severe event like this. We actually gave her some baby aspirin after because she was so stiff and acted so sore all over. I can just imagine that her muscles would be sore after that major contracting and spasming she went through. She is sleeping soundly in Daddy's lap now. It's 9:40pm here now.

[MariaRosa]

Hi again Celeste...I came back to find out if you listed the state where you're from, and you did! Good! This will help me out lots in my searching.
Yes, they sure do get stiff and sore, don't they...poor things. One other thing I wanted to tell you, is to really pay attention to your pup, as they often know in advance when another seizure may be coming. It sounds like your dog may be doing just that! Bootsie will stick to me like GLUE for up to 3 days prior to having a seizure. Anywhere I am in the house, she will have to be right there, and directly touching me.
I also want to give you this advice: Keep a diary of these seizures. In it, record the following info:
* The date and time of the seizure,
* Record exactly what happens during the seizure,
* Record any unusual behaviour you noticed prior to the seizure,
* Record the duration of the seizure,
* Record your observations of Missie's behaviour after the seizure has ended.
* And continue making notes in re to her appetite, elimination, and any other things that come to mind.

It's a big help if you can keep a stopwatch nearby, or one you acn wear around your neck, so that you can use it to time the seizures. Without one, it can be difficult to guess...they seem so long when you are watching it. If nothing else, try to keep a clock in easy view in the rooms you spend the most time in.

This diary, if you do use it, will be an invaluable help to your vet.

It very well could be that Missie was having mild seizures that you didn't recognize as being seizures. For the first four years, I had no clue what they were either. It wasn't until they began to worsen and get longer that I brought it up to the vet and found out what they were!

Ok, Celeste....check back, ok? I'm going to go look some more.
Love-Paula