R.I.P. Miss P

[Palimpsest]

Thanks so much everyone.

Perhaps the good thoughts are helping! I just spoke to the overnight vet at the animal hospital and she said Miss P. is hanging in there. Apparently what set off her kidneys was a bladder infection, so she's on IV antibiotics, anti-nausea meds and good pain control. I'm going over to see her soon and they will have the sonogram results by then. We hope there is nothing dire going on with her liver or pancreas.

We're very lucky because we have a wonderful regular vet practically around the corner, and a brand new 24 hour Emergency Animal Hospital just opened only 15 minutes away. They've been great so far.

She'll definitely have to stay in the hospital for another 24/48 hours. If she starts eating again it will be a really good sign. So please keep the good thoughts coming. Thanks!

[Whoosh]

Positive thoughts are ongoing for your whole family, especially Miss P. So happy to hear the positive news. Hoping her digestive system gets back on track soon.

[Palimpsest]

Thanks!

Quick update and it is mostly good news. I went over to see Miss P. twice today and she is looking a little better. It's sad though, and perhaps I shouldn't visit. When she hears my voice she tries to stagger to her feet expecting to be sprung from the joint. And then I have to leave her there. The good news is that she is alert enough to try to stand up. She is fairly buzzed on the IV pain meds too.

The ultrasound results came back later than I had expected. Nothing dramatic or relevant, although there are some small nodes on her liver, normal for a dog her age, that we might want to aspirate in case they are cancerous. Whoever read the sonogram didn't think it was necessary so I'll be discussing that with my regular vet as part of the bigger QoL discussion.

Unfortunately a lot of pain meds aren't good for the kidneys. We are stuck with Tramadol at the moment, which she hates and does her best to spit out. We've even tried it as a bacon flavored liquid compound and she still knows it is that evil tasting drug. She's a smart and pretty stubborn hound. :)

If she continues to improve, and if she starts eating, we may be able to bring her home as early as tomorrow night. I really hope so! We all miss her.

All together now: Eat Miss P. Please eat!

[Browneyed Girl]

Miss P - we haven't officially met before. My name is BEG. Yup BEG (or Browneyed Girl but I think for you BEG is cuter). So this is me offering you bacon. I'm saying it really softly because I'm pretty sure your mama will be not happy if I give this to you. So let's make a deal - you take your meds, and have something to eat and drink, and this bacon is ALL YOURS, and it's our little secret SSSHHHHH

[HerNameIsBuffy]

I'm so sorry your girl is going through this. I know how hard this is.

My best thoughts are headed to her. One of our girls hated tramadol, too...liverwurst helped a little. Sometimes shed swallow without knowing.

Really hope everything turns out okay.

[Geechee Girl]

I'm sending y'all healing vibes, and holding y'all in the LIght.

[What the fux say]

Glad to hear that she's doing better. I hope she continues getting better and gets to go home soon.

[Palimpsest]

Just spoke to the hospital vet: Miss P. has accepted a few nibbles of food from her favored vet-tech's hand. Yay!

They think she may be ready to come home around 8:00 pm today if she keeps this up.

I'll respond properly to all your lovely posts later, but I'm off to visit my pup now.

Thanks for keeping her in your thoughts!

[blessalessi]

Glad to hear it. Hope she continues to pull through. :)

[thoughtful]

Just saw this -- thinking of you, Mr. P, and Miss P. Give her some love from me, please.

Hope this upturn continues, and she comes home and continues to heal!

[Palimpsest]

I just deleted a very l-o-n-g post because I was getting bogged down unnecessary medical detail. And word salad. And technicalities of kidney diets. I may try to make better sense tomorrow. :lol:

Bottom line:

- Consider yourself all "liked." Thanks so much!

- She's home. Last minute problematic issue: stay in hospital with more IV fluids and monitoring vs benefits of possibly eating at home? A toss up and a risk either way.

- I think we made the right decision. She is home and eating. Chicken baby food in tiny but frequent amounts.

- I really pity babies. That baby food smells disgusting and it is smeared all over me! Yuck! Epi-hound and Little Guy are helping with clean up. They are glad to have Miss P. home too.

Thanks again.

[bionicmlle]

Sending you and Miss P healing vibes. I know all too well the pain of losing a beloved hound and I ask you to smell her ears for me. (God, that sounds weird --- I'm sorry, but I think you KNOW what I mean???) I know you are taking the best care of her and her senior years are honored! What a gift to our pets.

[Walking Cat Bed]

The Tiny Kitten and I send loves -- and she sends purry mrrrows and head bonks.

[Browneyed Girl]

Miss P it's me, your friend BEG. I promised you bacon if you took your meds and had something to eat and drink...

Here you go :pizza:

Ok I know that's pizza but I couldn't find a bacon smilie. It's a bacon pizza with no sauce, so I picked off the bacon for you.

Hugs to you and your mama.

[church_of_dog]

Miss P it's me, your friend BEG. I promised you bacon if you took your meds and had something to eat and drink...

Here you go :pizza:

Ok I know that's pizza but I couldn't find a bacon smilie. It's a bacon pizza with no sauce, so I picked off the bacon for you.

Hugs to you and your mama.

We actually have a bacon smilie! :bacon:

And I'm so glad to hear Miss P is home and eating and snuggling.

[Palimpsest]

Miss P. says thank you very much to BEG for the bacon. She thanks you all for the good thoughts and suggestions for treats. She would also like to let FJ know that favored vet tech was HOT. Much hotter than John Maxwell. :lol:

I'm still hand-feeding her tiny amounts of whatever she fancies and offering food about every 45 minutes - although we both took a break and slept for 5 hours straight last night. It's more important to get food into her than to worry about the kidney diet right now, although I'm supposed to ease her back onto that ASAP. I've offered her a wide assortment of food (including the suggestions here, thanks) but she seems to like the chicken and gravy baby food the best. Go figure.

[Post interrupted, because Miss P. asked to go out. Yay, she pooped! She had enough food in her to need to poop. :)]

She won't eat unless I hand feed her and strongly resents the addition of pasta or veggies. I'd say she's only taking an ounce each time. This is going to take a while.

There is a whole lot of gunk on the internet about should you/shouldn't you feed low protein diets for renal disease. All I can say is that low protein has kept Miss P. going for about a year. She was originally diagnosed because I was worried about weight loss. She gained the weight back and her blood work improved a lot. We used Hill's KD supplemented by home cooking.

The problem is that, if you are a dog, low protein diets suck. Lots of (non-toxic to dogs) veggies, fruit, pasta and rice but very little good stinky stuff like meat, cheese, fish and so on. I weigh her food for home cooked meals to get the right proportions. This makes getting pills down Her Majesty a real challenge. I vastly prefer to hide them in treats but use the pill on back of tongue, clamp jaws shut, massage throat method when I have to. I call it "down the hatch." BTW, tramadol tastes awful. No, I don't steal the dog's meds but I did lick a tablet to find out what the objections were about.

Now I know why she will no longer touch canned pumpkin. I once hid a pill in pumpkin in her breakfast. She bit into it, backed away, stamped her feet, and actually barked at her dog bowl. P's hot vet-tech showed me his method of squirting liquid tramadol down her gullet. He got serious stink-eye from her but she couldn't gag and spit it right out again. :)

Where we are now is that her kidneys are even more damaged. They think she "plateaued" after all the fluids to flush the toxins out. Additional fluids wouldn't have helped lower her levels any more, so she now has a new normal for elevated kidney values. It is not good news. We have to recheck her BP on Saturday. It was sky high in the hospital and she is on a new BP med. It is also a vicious cycle: failing kidneys cause UTIs because the urine dilutes and bacteria grows. UTIs damage the kidneys over time.

If another vet tells me that cats have a better prognosis with renal disease, I'll scream. Or get a cat. No, I can't do that because Epi-Hound wants to eat cats.

So it looks as if she is pulling through this time, but we are going to take it day by day and always keep her quality of life in mind.

Marathon post. Sorry.

[Browneyed Girl]

We actually have a bacon smilie! :bacon:

Thank you - that's what I get for trying to find a smilie before I've had a coffee. :D

How could I doubt there would be a bacon smilie.

Palimpsest your long post had me howling with laughter as I pictured Miss P, canned pumpkin and the hot tech vet guy.

And because my coffeeless brain couldn't see it this morning - Miss P here you go.

:bacon: :bacon: :bacon:

[sawasdee]

All the best Miss P - I sympathise over the baby food......

[church_of_dog]

[Post interrupted, because Miss P. asked to go out. Yay, she pooped! She had enough food in her to need to poop. :)]

There is a very select group of people in the world who understand the sheer joy of this. I am one of them. Hugs!

BTW, tramadol tastes awful. No, I don't steal the dog's meds but I did lick a tablet to find out what the objections were about.

I totally love that you did this. I hadn't heard about it tasting awful, and my dog Luna was on it for quite a while, but until her final few days she never rejected a pill pocket, so hopefully she never tasted the pill itself.

I once hid a pill in pumpkin in her breakfast. She bit into it, backed away, stamped her feet, and actually barked at her dog bowl.

I rarely actually laugh out loud, even if I say "lol". This time I actually DID l. o. l. at that.

Where we are now is that her kidneys are even more damaged. They think she "plateaued" after all the fluids to flush the toxins out. Additional fluids wouldn't have helped lower her levels any more, so she now has a new normal for elevated kidney values. It is not good news. We have to recheck her BP on Saturday. It was sky high in the hospital and she is on a new BP med. It is also a vicious cycle: failing kidneys cause UTIs because the urine dilutes and bacteria grows. UTIs damage the kidneys over time.

If another vet tells me that cats have a better prognosis with renal disease, I'll scream. Or get a cat. No, I can't do that because Epi-Hound wants to eat cats.

So it looks as if she is pulling through this time, but we are going to take it day by day and always keep her quality of life in mind.

Marathon post. Sorry.

Many hugs and thoughts are with you and Miss P. I lost miss Luna last October 1st and so one year ago now we were deep into the Tramadol Days, dealing with her steep decline. I haz some sad memories these days... I hope you and Miss P have years left together. :hug:

[Growelly]

The quality of a person can usually be linked to how they treat their fur families.

I'm so glad she's doing better.

[thoughtful]

Give that sweet girl ear-rubs from me.

I'm pretty sure we talked about this when my greyhound went through a total lack of appetite, but I got more food into her by using a syringe to gently squeeze it onto the roof of her mouth. That got her licking, and she took more than if I used a spoon.

Just a thought -- don't know if it would help.

Glad she had enough in her to want to poop!

[Whoosh]

YAY POOP!!! :banana-angel: :banana-dreads: :banana-angel:

I am not the praying sort, but I have been wishing for poop all day. Once even out loud :shock:

My thoughts are with y'all. Give Miss P plenty of loves and kisses from my neck of the woods.

[bionicmlle]

Congrats on the poop!! Glad Miss P is doing a little better.

Tramadol is the worst -- they HATE it, don't they? The only thing that ever worked for my boy was the Kirkland brand pill pockets but it doesn't sound like that's an option for you. I like the idea of liquid - maybe follow-up with a carrot to clear up that bitter taste.

Sending healing your way.

[Palimpsest]

It looks as though we are over the hump food-wise!

Miss P. ate a small amount of Gerber chicken mixed with pasta and a few pureed green beans last night. Still hand-feeding but that was a move in the right direction. I calculated how much food she'd managed over the day and we called it a night.

This morning she only got her pills in baby food. She then accepted a little poached fish and rice with more pureed green beans. She actually ate a few bites all on her own. I think that's only because she wanted to pick out the pieces of fish but it is a huge step in the right direction. I'll try her with a bit more in a couple of hours. She also felt well enough to be a PITA about her Tramadol. :banana-dance:

Picking out things I need to respond to from above. I hope I don't miss anything.

BionicMlle, I did smell her ears for you. I know what you mean, and we are both weird. :lol:

I agree with church_of_dog that it is only a select few who get so exited about dogs actually pooping. I'm so sorry to hear about Luna.

The Tramadol Wars have been going on for months. She is stubborn, but I am even more stubborn and very sneaky. The Kirkland pill pockets go down well with Epi-hound, but Miss. P would have had a great career as a drug sniffing dog. She smells every. single. bite. and if she gets a whiff of Tramadol she rejects the treat or pill pocket.

I've even used 3 pill pockets, Tramadol in only one, and mixed them up so even I don't know which is which. She can pick out and reject the Trojan Horse every single time. If I get it into in her mouth I immediately get hit with a pill pocket spit ball! With the Tramadol, we moved from the tablets to capsules before we resorted to the compounded bacon-flavored liquid. I can only smell the bacon. Not so with Miss. P! I remember that it was a capsule she found in her pumpkin.

Browneyed Girl, I'm glad the pumpkin story made you laugh. You are making me laugh a lot too. Miss P is a character, and the only greyhound I've owned who literally stamps her feet when she gets mad. A friend of mine has another foot stamper so Miss P is not unique. We found out that our two girls are half-sisters so perhaps it runs in the family.

The syringe feeding is a great idea for most dogs, but Miss. P now associates oral syringes with Tramadol. See above. I usually start with my fingers and then use a spoon because that means they do eat more. Unfortunately, that baby food is rather slushy so it splashed from the spoon. The reward for the other two dogs for staying on their beds while I feed P is to lick me clean afterwards. Little Guy even found some baby food in my hair! This is probably another thing thing that only other dog people will understand. So gross. :lol:

This is not the first dog I have had to coax food into. I've found that "little and often" works better than trying to push too much food at one time. I sometimes wonder what they are thinking. Probably, "Can't that woman get a clue? I'm feeling sick to my stomach and she keeps waving smelly food in my face!"

I keep forgetting to say: She is also on Gabapentin for pain. It is not as effective as the Tramadol but she takes that capsule with no problems.

[thoughtful]

She's just too darned smart!