sick dog – aliciajoseph

Despite my constant intention to be more consistent with this blog, (do people even read blogs anymore?) the months soared with not a word written. As the year comes to a wrap, I have neglected not just my blog writing but also my author writing.

Life got chaotic. A sick dog. An unexpected stay by a family member and her dog. Two dogs-one old and sick. The other-healthy but anxious. A young, fearful, and unpredictable dog can be as stressful as a dog who barks in the night to be cared for.

Phil’s illness started in March. Coughing and wheezing through the night, with a very congested nose. A vet appointment resulted in an upper respiratory infection. Antibiotics cured the infection but not the overly snotty (sorry, will be writing about snots a lot) nose. That got worse.

More medication with an antihistamine. Wait for two to three weeks. Nothing. Then stronger meds. Wait more weeks. Still, nothing. My poor baby could barely breathe. Through the night he’d struggle to hock the phlegm free from his nose. I’d be there with tissue to pull the yellow mucous from his nose, stringy and thick like a pulled mozzarella stick (gross but true) from his nostrils.

This went on for months. I kept tissues all over the house to be ready for the boogers. There were plenty.

After another vet appointment, we tried steroids. With a concoction of prednisone, an antibiotic, and five Benadryl tablets a day, Phil could finally breathe easy. After about three months of sleepless nights, Phil and I were finally able to get some sleep.

As is often the case with prednisone, (I know from experience) the drug may ease the intended health issue, but it also causes harsh symptoms of its own. Phil’s back legs grew weaker. Being fifteen, they weren’t strong to begin with. He could no longer climb stairs and needed help getting up. Even with no-slip booties, he has difficulty walking.

The steroids gave him an insatiable thirst and appetite. He was unable to be calm, constantly panting and pacing. I no longer recognized my dog. While the old Phil would lick me all over the face, the sick Phil turned his head from me. I understood the changes he was going through, (I had the same side effects) but he didn’t.

A month later, I called the vet and told him we needed to wean Phil off those crazy pills. His legs slowly got stronger. He still can’t do stairs and a couple of times when the gate wasn’t up, he tried to go downstairs and fell the entire way down. I hurried to him (cursing myself for forgetting to put the gate back up) and plucked him back to his feet. The old dog shook himself off and slowly walked around the entire basement, taking in what used to be his territory.

Since he was already down there, I lifted him onto the couch. We cuddled together like we used to all of those years–14 years (he was two when I adopted him). He misses his basement. That is where we spent the most time together. It’s where we slept and spent lazy days/nights on the couch. It’s where he stood/ lay next to me on the floor while I did yoga–giving me kisses at every opportunity. Sometimes, he’d lie so close to me that his seventy-pound body pressed against mine and I couldn’t move to do yoga or any exercise.

But that’s where he always wanted to be–next to me.

There’s so much I already miss about him. He was a lazy, calm, loving dog that I used to have to wake up at ten because he’d sleep till noon if I’d let him.

Now he wakes up at six with a bark. If he needs me at night, he barks. Sometimes he barks throughout the day just as he lying on his blanket, not seeming to need anything. Except, for a little attention.

It’s a strange feeling, missing your dog while he’s still alive.

I’m missing the way he used to be. The way we used to be together. I didn’t think time would ever change our relationship. But the dynamics of a relationship never lasts for anyone/thing. Not for siblings. Not for parents. Not for friends. Not for lovers. Not even for dogs and their owners.

Everything changes.

I know I just spent my last Thanksgiving with him, and this Christmas will also be Phil’s last. I adopted Phil from Animal Care and Control on December 26,2010. He is a Pitbull mix. Not the type of dog that usually makes its way out of Animal Control with a beating heart.

Five months ago, I didn’t think he’d be alive come Labor Day. Now I have hope he will be with me to celebrate his 14th Gotcha Day with me. Last year, we had a huge birthday party for him. I turned a post-Christmas party with my siblings, nieces, and nephews into a huge birthday celebration.

We had birthday decorations, birthday hats, a birthday cake, and, of course, a birthday song. I’m glad I did that last year. I don’t think my sixteen-year-old doggie will be up for all that commotion this time around the sun. Though, I don’t think he’d mind a birthday cake.

So, Phil is not the same. He barks a lot. He wakes me up at all times of the night/morning. I am sometimes impatient though I try not to be. One day I will miss that bark. I will hear his bark only in my dreams and will wake up hoping it is real, expecting to see him. Then reality will set in. My dog is no longer here. How will I take that?

I don’t yet know. My dog is still here. Upstairs. Sleeping quietly, for now. I will go to him and kiss the top of his nose. Smell is fur. Hold him in my arms. Tonight, I will hear his bark. And no matter how tired I am, I won’t get frustrated, because I’ll remember a time will come when the bark I hear will no longer be real.

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My dog, Phil, has arthritis, mostly in his right back leg. So when he started favoring that leg, I gave him an anti-inflammatory I keep on hand for such occasions. Within a couple days, the limp went away and I stopped giving the anti-inflammatories. But four days after the initial limp in his right leg, Phil started hobbling, while favoring his left hind leg. This was unusual. The left leg wasn’t the usual favored leg, and the limp was never that drastic. So I called the vet the next morning and got Phil in for an examination that day. The doctor felt a tear, but I would need to see a surgeon to confirm. In the meantime, Phil’s anti-inflammatory was upped in dosage. This was on a Friday. By Thursday of the following week, my dog was dying of liver failure.

I had an appointment with the surgeon on Wednesday (before I knew about his failing liver), and a few nights before this, Phil was throwing up and not eating. I chucked it up to the stress he must have been feeling related to his injured leg. But blood tests showed morbidly high levels of liver enzymes, and I wasn’t prepared for the call from the surgeon telling me she was extremely concerned about my dog.

Just a few weeks ago, he’d been a completely happy and healthy dog. For an eleven-year old, Phil had avoided major health issues until now. Other than the usual yearly check-ups, I’d only had to take Phil to the doctor for an innocuous eye infection and common stomach issues. So it was crushing to accept that my dog was suddenly sick enough to die.

Phil sick

I spoke with my vet, and Phil was immediately given fluids that evening and put on seven different medications. His eyes and gums were heavily jaundiced, and it worried me. The hope was that we’d get enough fluids in his body to flush the liver. He was drinking on his own, but hardly eating, even with an appetite stimulant, but at least what he was eating, he was keeping down. Our go-to food was my mom’s homemade meatballs. Even with a failing liver, homemade Italian food was apparently hard to resist.

For the next few days, he went to the vet for IV fluids. After five days of almost no improvement, the doctor told me she wasn’t very hopeful, but if this was her dog, she’d give him a couple more days. A couple more days? Those words cut me deep. We were standing in the vet parking lot. The tears were hard to stop, though I don’t remember trying.

While Phil was at the vet getting fluids, I spent the time without him browsing through pictures on my phone, some taken at a park a mere two weeks before this happened. Those were emotional pictures to look at, because I knew the me in those pictures, with my dog, couldn’t fathom the reality that was in store in the short future.

Phil sick 5

I couldn’t stand being without him all day while he got his fluids, and I thought if my time with him was limited, I needed to be with him as much as I could. The vet agreed and she gave me fluids to put under his skin at home. You don’t go through a vein, you just stick a needle, attached to a long tube connected to a bag of fluids, in his skin. My brother did the honors of sticking him. I just couldn’t do it.

My brother loves that dog as much as I do. All you have to do is utter the word “Uncle” in front of Phil, and Phil’ll jump to his feet, tail speed-waggin’, in search of his favorite person. It’s heart-warming knowing my dog is so well-loved by people other than myself. Aside from his “Uncle”, Phil has a “Grandma”, “Aunties”, and “Cousins” who were all concerned for him. I had so much support from my family, I never went to a vet appointment alone. My brother was with me for every one of them, as well as for the fluids done at home

Phil loves sitting outside in the grass, so we sat outside as much as he wanted. Because Phil was filled with so much fluids, he needed to go out three or four times during the night. At three o’clock in the morning one night, Phil wanted to lie underneath a tree, near the street in front of our house, his favorite spot. It was a still and cool late July night, and I sat beside him and watched him take the night in. Phil was always so content and happy being outside.

One Sunday afternoon, a few days later, we sat underneath that same tree, and I thought this would be our last Sunday afternoon together. I kept noting the time, so that the next Sunday, I could look at the clock and say “at this time last week, I was lying in the grass with my baby”. Or, “At this time, I was rubbing Phil’s stomach.” I wanted to be able to look back on that Sunday and remember how every moment was spent with him. I was so conscious of my time with him. I suppose that’s what you do when you think you are living your last moments with a dog who is your everything.

The only other thing Phil loved more than sitting outside, was going to the park. My brother and I took him for a ride to his favorite place, and we took a lot of pictures. I hated thinking this was the end, but I wanted these days documented. I wanted to be able to look back at the possible last days of my dog’s life and know that despite everything he was going through, Phil was happy. I didn’t like thinking that way, but the vet’s words of hopelessness never left my mind, though it was hard to accept.

Still, after those “couple of days” the vet said she’d give her dog had passed, there was no doubt we were continuing with treatment. After a few more days of fluids and medication, we did another blood test, and though the levels were still high, they were lower than the previous test. And that was all the hope I needed. And when you’re pathetically desperate, as I was, all you can ask for is hope. Phil was still jaundiced, but we continued on.

About three weeks after getting the blood results that had showed his liver was failing, another blood test revealed all of his levels were back to normal. My dog survived liver failure. It is a major understatement to say that I am relieved and so appreciative to be allowed more time with my baby.

As Phil continues to age, I knew this wouldn’t be the last of his ailments, but I didn’t expect the next thing to happen so soon. The day after that last blood test, I noticed Phil’s right ear looked a little red. I thought it maybe have been an allergic reaction to something, so I left it be. But the next day it was even redder, so I called the vet. By the time I got an appointment, the infection was in both ears. A double ear infection seemed so innocuous compared to the liver failure he’d just survived, so I wasn’t very concerned. Phil was prescribed ear drops, but after three days of giving him those drops, my dog had completely lost his hearing.

I called the vet, and was told an ingredient in the drops, gentamicin, can cause hearing loss. The vet expected Phil’s hearing to come back after a couple days and periodic flushing, but it’s been five days now, and he still can’t hear his mommy’s voice.

In the last two months, Phil tore his ACL, survived liver failure, and is currently deaf. I wonder what is going through his mind. I know he’s confused, because he’s even needier towards me than he used to me. It’s as though he needs extra reassurance from his momma that he’s gonna be okay.

I haven’t given up hope that he will hear again, cuz what do you have if you haven’t got hope? If we got through liver failure together, we’ll get through this. Despite what happens, Phil will be okay because he’s loved so much, and I can only hope that he knows it.