Bulldogs World

Our Lhasa used to wear a collar and if it would clank on his water dish, he wouldn't go near it for days.  Maybe something scared her while she was drinking. 

hmm. maybe that could be it. i told you, i'm paranoid, lol...

it was just weird the way she was sniffing at the water dish like there was something wrong with it.

per our usual summer friday evening we went and took a walk around the air-conditioned PetCo about an hour ago and she did take a swig from her bottle of spring water afterward. So I'm okay, for now. Plus she did pee before we got in the car so you're right, she did get fluids from somewhere. 

thanks for telling me that!

vomited right after she woke up this morning. ate normally. still hasn't touched the water bowl. took water from the bottle of Evian after her walk this morning. Seems fine right now although no more water. I did just give her a raw beef bone which she's going to town on. I'm about to take it away so she doesn't have too much. 

she likes the spring water no chemical taste from it like house water has.  Try some spring water in her bowl and see if she drinks that.  She may be smelling the chemicals in the house water .  Spring water or filtered water is much better for her anyway.  Smart girl

I was curious to see how the raw feedings are going....I just ordered a few books and am hoping to find some quiet time once the kids go back to school this week. If I embark on this adventure I am going to make my own raw patties. I still can't get over the bone thing, but I will at some point I guess.

First off, Matilda loves the raw food. I cut it into tiny pieces and I bought a much larger, flatter pan to feed her in so she goes more slowly. She dances and chirps for it over in her "place" where she has to wait for it to be ready. She has a tough time waiting :)

I am feeding Nature's Variety and I started with the chicken kind. It has only been about a week, so I'm still trying to figure out how to do this right although the patties themselves (and the little things they call "chubs" that you can buy that are a bit smaller) are very easy. I found another store that carries them close to home. This is good because the other place that carried them also sells puppies. Yup...I walked in and was assaulted by a row of doggies in the window. I thought "well, I guess we're gonna have to buy this online or something"...I really didn't want to give them my money.

But! Luckily there was another place just up the road.

As for success with our concerns, I haven't seen any yet. In fact, I'm wondering if perhaps things get worse before they get better. For instance, this weekend I noticed that the runny eyes seemed much worse. It got to the point where one of her wrinkles turned red, and I'm no bully neophyte; I clean her wrinkles every day, dry them, and apply Panolog.

To make matters worse, we'd just had a visit to the vet to talk about allergies in general and the switch to raw (pointless, really, they told me to give her Zyrtec so $117 dollars later I learned something I already knew) and last night she woke up in the middle of the night to scratch her left ear and then lick her foot. This tells me that there's a worse yeast problem than we're already dealing with. I looked in her ear and it was red. I cleaned it and dried with peroxide and apple cider vinegar and she went back to sleep. I am a very light sleeper; I can hear her wake up. I know when she is comfortable because her breathing changes to a deep, light snore. If she stops breathing that way, I wake up. People ask me: does she snore? I say yeah, and thank God.

Anyway, she woke up twice to itch her ear.

This morning, we were taking a walk and she would NOT go the bathroom. She likes enclosed little hidey-places to poop in, and I don't blame her, but in this area most little thickets in the city are vacant lots filled with poison ivy, broken glass and God knows what. There have been times when we've seen syringes. Thankfully I am not the type of dog owner that does not watch the dog while she's investigating. As with many bullies, it goes in the mouth first and THEN she decides if she wants it.

The grass is wet, too, which she hates, and I don't blame her. I know this is going to sound crazy but I feel this sense of "thank you!!!" when she goes and it is normal. Last few days it was much smaller and firmer, but it did smell. Perhaps this means simply that she is now able to empty her glands when she goes. But no poop once a day and I can't concentrate. You would think it was me.

On an unrelated note, after attempting to select several spots to go on and rejecting them, she began limping on her back leg. Yay. She seemed okay once we got back to the house but with bullies I wish they could talk; I don't want to find out she's injured herself. All I could think was "@#$%(%(%*!!! She's torn that $*&%*&ing tendon!!!".

The next course of action is to eliminate all of her treats and match them to the food she's eating. The variety we chose; chicken, could be the culprit. I bought some beef formula and am going to switch it and match her treats to it . Right now, she has dried liver treats (I need something I can carry on a walk), she eats yogurt and a probiotic fish oil on her food and that's it. When we go to PetCo, she sometimes picks little crunchies off the floor that she finds but I find it difficult to believe that this could have been the contaminant. She had fish and potato treats (the van Patten ones) and I stopped giving those last week.

I do *not* want to discourage anyone from doing this; only that for us it is has been a week and this is an experiment in making this dog as comfortable as she can be. I will do whatever I can to find out what the problem is. I really, REALLY want this to work. Would you want to walk around with a lifetime yeast infection? That is how I look at it. If it turns out that chicken is the culprit and it is a single source protein allergy than what I am hoping is that the switch to beef (and then the others in rotation) will help. The vet says not to rule out an airborne allergen such as mold or grass, but the benadryl or Zyrtec should help with that and with the yeasty feet and ears - I don't think so. Unless she is of course allergic to the boiling vinegar and water and baking soda that I clean the floors with.

The point is, know your dog really well and watch them carefully during this process. I'm sure most dogs would love the raw food and we haven't had digestive issues (burping, gas, hacking after eating) so that's a plus. I will also say that recently she began drinking periodically from her bowl but takes much less water. That said, when she pees it is much lighter and she pretty much goes the same amount which means she's getting enough fluids.

We have a vet appointment at 8:30pm this evening for the ear. I do not intend to be as pleasant this time. I am not an expert, but I'm also not an idiot.

For the amount of money I give them (probably 2k a year?), you would think that they could come up with something better than perhaps not worrying about the food and putting her on a daily antifungal.

On a side note, the local representative from the bully rescue visited on Saturday because I'm thinking about become a resource volunteer. She said I'd done really well with her and need to stop being so hard on myself; we'll figure this out.

So there you have it. A pretty long update and you can tell I'm the paranoid sort.