happened very early yesterday morning, when my three-year-old pup, Harley, had a full-blown grand mal seizure.
My room is very small, so when I'm at my desk on the computer, I'm right up against the bed. I heard a "thump" and saw Harley on the floor. Not an unusual occurrence, since he tends to get tangled up in the sheet or pillow case and take a tumble while trying to get out again.
This time when I glanced over, however, instead of a sheepishly tail-wagging Harley, I saw him splayed out on the floor like a starfish, his tail whipping back and forth as he frantically rubbed his face into the carpet, all four limbs trembling and shaking. I totally freaked out as it seemed to go on forever, but was most likely only seconds.
After he stopped seizing, he tried to get up but was unable to. I tried to set him on his feet, but he just fell over. I picked him up and took with me as I went to my roommate Mulligan's room to ask for help. (Sorry for waking you in the middle of the night, Pal!)
I was well aware that there wasn't really anything he could do to help with Harley, but just having him as a sounding board was very helpful.
Harley was by now at least responding to his name and weakly trying to wag his tail. When I put him down, he was able to stagger a few steps before falling over again.
I made the decision not to take him to the vet, since I knew that nothing could be accomplished by that except wasting my money.
After we went back to my room, I kept Harley on my lap while I hied myself to google to do some research. He just buried his head between my thigh and my elbow, maybe the light was bothering him. I just don't know. This whole situation freaked me the fuck out, and I was near tears as Harley was recovering. The oddest part of it all was Tucker's reaction. He literally got up and moved away whenever the recovering Harley tried to snuggle with him. Totally unheard of behavior in Tucker!
The research showed me that idiopathic epilepsy (scroll down) does crop up in Italian Greyhounds, with an onset between ages 2 to 5 years. I did a TON of research before I settled on this breed, but somehow missed this. Dammit
About an hour after the seizure, Harley was his old self again, and he and Tucker were snuggled up together on the dog bed under my desk.
I was very shaken by this whole ordeal, especially after talking with his vet yesterday morning. There's nothing anyone can do, I'm supposed to just "keep [my] eye on him" and hope for the best. If he has more frequent or more severe seizures (though I can't imagine anything more severe!), he'll have to be put on phenobarbital to control them. Which would fucking suck..
So all this is in addition to the ongoing battle against ringworm, which is one I SEEM to be winning, albeit very slowly. Weekly lime-sulfur dips are the pits. Not to mention stinky. And expensive. *sigh*
Sorry to be all "woe is me", but if I can't vent on my own blog, what good is it?
Hopefully I'll be back with a cheerier topic tomorrow. We'll see.
12 comments:
Fingers crossed for you and the pup.
And vent away. You never know who's reading and what helpful thing they might come up with.
Anon.
Thank you, Anonymous! I appreciate it.
Christina, I know just how freaky it is when your pup has a seizure. Farmdog has an epileptic disorder too, she's on primidone for them, and it works really well. It can even lessen the severity of a seizure series if I can give it to her between seizures. Without the pill she'll generally seize, then come out of it a bit, then seize again, and if I can get the pill down her after the first one (and she knows it helps, she'll eat anything I hand her as soon as she can open her mouth and swallow if she can see or smell the pill in it, otherwise she won't touch it) then she'll either have a minor one or not have another one at all.
Hugs for you and for Harley, and here's hoping it was a freak one time thing and you don't have to deal with it again.
:( Oh no. I hope the doggies are okay.
Hugs to you and the puppies hun. I hope this is not a recurring thing. It really stinks when our babies don't feel good! Love ya!
Hugs to you, Christina. My Labrador had epilepsy as a result of abuse by his previous owner, and for several years was on daily phenobarbitol in an (unsuccessful) effort to control his fits. Fortunately, the phenobarb 'took the edge' off the fits, so that while they incapacitated him for 30-60 seconds, he recovered very quickly. He managed to live a long and happy life despite his condition, so here's hoping your pup will do the same.
Toby had the same kind of thing. There was nothing we could do, but hold him till it was over, then help him get around after wards till he was back to normal. It's a scary thing, but as long as it doesn't get worse, he should be ok!
I hope y'all realize just how incredible you are. Thank you so much for the support, I feel a ton better about everything. Just knowing that I'm not the only one going through this (though of course intellectually I was aware) helps tremendously. I'm lucky to have such good friends!
*smooch*
That's a kiss for all of you!
OMG, honey! That horrific heart-stricken feeling is the absolute worst. I'm glad that he's feeling better and that there's an explanation that can be managed. *HUGE HUGS and LOVE to you and Harley*
Oh, wow, poor Harley, poor you!!! I'm glad you were there to comfort him until he came out of it. Hopefully this was just a freak occurrence and won't happen again, or only very infrequently. Hugs to you both!!
Poor Harley baby! Give him an extra hug from me. I wish I had something constructive to tell you.
Phlegmmy, Miz Minka, Jenni...THANK YOU, MY DEARS! *smooch*
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