Dances with DS

Things are maniac here.  The washing/ironing/ packing knows no end.   I eat  as best I can but it’s just not great. Better  than a few weeks ago but  I feel I am still in shortfalls.

My days are dysfunctionally empty without Petal. I miss her as much as I did initially and I am panicked that I can’t seem to heal or find closure about her death. At night I can’t sleep without reliving those last awful hours she had. I think if only I could rewrite those hours, if I’d have known there was no hope I would have put her to sleep gently instead.  I try not to express my daily grief as it only upsets my broader circle family & friends, but I also feel they don’t want to hear about my grief as it appears unnaturally protracted. My immediate family are much like me though, we all still float about in this sense of loss. I wonder if this will ever abate, dammit! Or has it cut me so deeply that I will forever have a lame pulse of missing in my heart.  Maybe.

I am very stressed by the forthcoming trip & the fears I have for my mums safe transit though major surgery. These are not good days.

To further freak me out completely Pete had a sudden trip to Canada come up - yes in the first week that I am away. And here is my Zen, on meds, not in prime health but okay. Just okay. I really thought I might lose the plot when Pete told me this. Of all the crap timing. 

A kennel is out. I just can’t do that to him. So we frantically started to look for a home environment to place him in. Luckily there are such places. We found a fantastic agency that does just that and on Sunday we went to meet Fred & Bridget who are at home all day, adore dogs and seem a wonderful couple. Poochi made himself right at home very fast.  I know they are the best dog people we could have wished for to look after him. But I still feel really bad doing this to him. I can’t think about it as it only makes me feel miserable. At least he is getting 5 star care and loads of love. Could be a lot worse.

So I go to South Africa with a heavy heart about this even knowing this is the very best outcome under the circumstances possible for him.  I hope once I am there I can find the strength to help my mum the way she needs to be helped - I shall draw on inner resources I don’t know about - I hope!  The thing is I do love my mum dearly and would not be leaving her to go through this alone on my life. I need to try to lose my anxiety as it won’t serve  her in the least.  How?  I don’t have a clue. I’m just feeling angry because I feel like life is bollocksing me too hard right now. I have a great deal of frustration, mainly because I am a control freak deep down. I have had to drop plans I had on the work front because life is controlling me right now - not the other way around. And nope I am not going with the flow.  The flow is a great big  tidal wave  imo and  here I am throwing rage and sticks  at it! I should  build a raft instead.

I’m tasting how the knocks can drive a person down fast. How one could get selfish and hard…and I don’t want to evolve like that but I see things in myself I can’t stand at times like this.  I’m quite sick of being a drivelling moany stressy wreck now. I’m going to have to get my psyche to higher ground soon. I know I have the choice about how I percieve things. I know attitude is a choice.  But I also know it’s very hard to be ra-ra jolly hockeysticks when one is feeling pushed up against the wall face up.

Maybe when I am back on home soil I will look to the beautiful mountain and find some strength there. Perhaps I will walk along the sea on soft white sand and find energy again.  I know despite my fears and anxiety,  I will love being with my mum and among good friends and family. I know these times with my mum are precious jewels to savour and my focus must be on this fully.  I tell myself between the moments I could just spiral into mental incapacity, that it will be okay. That there is still some bigger plan that I can’t grasp. That I must hold the faith. That above all in my own despair I must not overlook the fact that others are greatly suffering too and that because of this I must be kinder than usual to everyone I meet.

Take care all my friends. If you are struggling as I am, hold the faith because that is all one has at these times.  Hold tight, it will be okay…for both of us. I shall think of you all and hope you are doing well with your surgeries and your lives.x

I will connect with most of you in 6 weeks time again.    

I’ve been determined to push through on the eating front at least. It’s no joke to start losing weight at my stage of the DS game. I’ve written enough times that ‘food is sometimes medicine with the DS’ to have brainwashed myself!

I’m not mad keen on eating but I still love food. This is quite an odd thing really as I always associated love of food with eating. I sit glued to foodie telly programs, but have no desire to taste the food myself. I still enjoy cooking, but sometimes I only take a few spoons to taste then eat what I have cooked the following day. I don’t have urgency to sit down and devour a bowl full. It’s quite strange really and I don’t understand it, but I think it is very much better than being driven by a compulsion to eat. For me, anyway.

So we sit, bowl of food & I. It is sometimes a long sit if I am honest. One bite interspaced with resolve. lol. Inevitably my food goes cold but I still go on chomping away with determination. Gotta do it!

Can’t say I lick the bowl though! What I find interesting is as soon as my body gets wind of too few calories, I start craving chocolate. I know it’s not actually chocolate I crave - it’s calories. The body speaks in strange ways. As volume eating is out for me right now, I find eating fattier food helps me at these times. So do nuts.
My trip to South Africa gets closer by the day. I’m unpacked and disorganised. I have no bra’s that fit. It’s not funny! The boobies are so small they slip out of my old ones now. Leaving me with a lopsided chest sometimes, as one stays put but the other departs south.

I had to get a doctors note to cover my butt regarding the amount of vitamins I need to take daily. In South Africa now vitamins are treated like cocaine…probably due to people trying to hock them as aids cures. It’s not that the government cares a jot for the people with aids, it is just that they sniff a big pie which they will try to control for profit. I better not go there otherwise I start thinking of Mbeki and Mgabes brotherhood and I lose the will to live. But be warned if you are travelling there as a DSer….get a doctors note for your vitamins.

Petals memorial garden is taking shape slowly. In a circle I am planting a beautiful maple tree. Around it I still plan to plant seasonal flowers, but right now there is not the time, it’ll be on hold till I get back.

I’m dreading leaving Zen right now, although my boy is doing okay. Problem is heartworm or no heartworm, he has such a bad heart murmur. I can feel it when I stroke his chest, it’s that bad. A whoosing and fibrilliation that goes beyond the ordinary pulse of life. I’m on borrowed time with him. I hate to say it but I know it. I know Pete will love him & care for him but he’s a mama’s boy. With Petal gone even more so. I cuddle him & fuss over him too much now. He misses her too, he seems at a bit of a loss without little miss personality egging him on everyday. She really brought energy to all our lives. Miss that piece of gorgeous everyday.

After indepth family discussions we feel we must not allow this empty hole in our lives to fester. We know our Zen may not be here for very much longer. We also know Petal is simply not replaceable but the quietness and somberness of our house sans a bullie-dog is fillable. It drives me to distraction how quiet and still the airwaves are here now. No bouncing buckeroo ball in mouth begging for walkies. No dippy mad running from room to room as only a bull terrier can do. No snuffles and wet nose pushing at our arms for cuddle times. The big empty prevails. So, we have begun to look at puppies. It’s very hard and somedays I think I just cannot go there and I should wait much longer. No doubt some people would judge us too for going this route so soon after her death, there are days I judge myself too and feel as though I betray my darling and dare to hope too much. But other days I think my Petal would want us to give our love and care to another dog and to have laughter,mud on the floors, mad fun and bullie-love again. We will see.

My blogs here are about to dry up for around 6 weeks while I am in SA. After that I’ll stop going so off topic, I promise! I won’t combine dogs and ds. I have plans to start another website focusing on French Heartworm Prevention, in memory of my piece of sunshine and all the other dogs we lose to it. I have decided I won’t fall back into bitterness and grief. I won’t. I’ll still ask ‘ Why oh Why my little Petal???  Why us?’ though for the rest of my life and I don’t want anyone else who loves dogs to ever need to live with the same question.

But sheeshpers ….I am getting a bit tired of the gods putting me onto such big missions in my life! What is this thing about me being given the happy tasks of raising awareness. First with my DS here in the UK - now with this Heartworm. ENOUGH!

As for this blog & my DS website I’ll do as much research as I can while I am away and once I am back we will lift off back into DS world and start to tackle the wonderful world of DS supplementation. Oh the joys!

I’m wondering if I will ever stop alternating between the anger and then the crushing grief that hits me like a cricket ball in the chest everytime I see another ‘mark’ of my Petally. And the girl did leave her mark every where, a bullies puppy jaws know no rest . In the nibbled wicker corner of a storage box I suddenly stop and get a sharp heart pang. Her bed is still in my room I cannot move it and it’s not healthy, but it was so painful to pack up her downstairs bed I haven’t the courage yet. In the garden her tyre on a rope hung, just aimlessly blowing in the wind until my son could bear it no longer and removed it in tears himself. I found her boney ball toy and her rope toy under the living room sofa and had to sit down to compose myself. I suppose I am going through those stages of grief one hears about.

During further research into heartworm I read of a dog brought back from the brink of death by vets who knew how to deal with it in a fast way and I had a rage in my soul a tempest and a ballistic storm all in one. It’s as well my car is not working right now else I may have in my mad grief found myself at the Vets reception screaming blue murder at them for NOT knowing how to save my baby. Somewhere deep down though I know it was too late but if only, if only… plays through me like a stuck record. I have no acceptance of this yet and my days kind of jolt past in broken down fractions of replays of happier days. I smile remembering my little minx, then weep copiously in the next minute.

I feel too much. Way to much. It’s a both a personal blessing because my life is made vivid with feeling in many ways because of this and what is ordinary to others often presents as extraordinary to me, I think. But on the flip side it’s a horrible curse too. When when people tell me of sadness in their lives, of how they lost a beloved sister, child or spouse, I feel selfish & self absorbed in my own current pool of swampy misery…guilty too that in me this loss of my puppygirl continues unabated in unimaginable ways. I keep thinking by comparison my loss is small, but perhaps the brevity of loss is a bit like love…it can’t be measured, nor compared. So I cry for them, me and the whole darned world of pain & loss all in one.

I should count my blessings, I tell myself, but my heart betrays what my mind thinks it should do and I fudge about aimlessly in my psyche.
What touches me is how in the middle of my crazy world right now, strangers reach out. There is a lovely lady in Wales who also lost the most darling puppy of 7 months ( I saw a pic of her baby) to heartworm and she reassures me that I am not actually going mad. That it is a terrible nightmare and that she too felt as I do now. Angry, bereft, cheated, bitter, sadder than sad and frustrated as all hell that so many Vets bump this off as ‘rare’ and not worthy of even putting up notices in their offices of it to warn all dog owners of it’s horrors, nor to do proper research in how dogs presenting as emergency cases could possibly be saved. I shall call her sometime soon to thank her, when I can speak of my Petal without dissolving.

Zenni boy shadows me right now. He always did but now it is more pronounced. He is ever by my side little orange furball comforter. I still have fears for his life too, but they are ebbing a little. He has been on prednicare (a steriod) for 3 days according to plan. The idea is that if the worms release antigens he may be spared toxic death. No problems yet which is a great relief, but I am neurotic - checking his poo for any signs of bleeding, ( oh the joys!) waking through the night when he so much as snuffles in his sleep to check on him. Perhaps I am also fraught and tired from so little sleep.

My day feels like a constant round of remembering pills - my own intake hits near 20 currently in various combo’s for best absorption at the mo. Zen only has two steriods a day but the timing must be on the mark…12 hours apart. I’m aware that by giving him these we are effectively shutting down his adrenal processes and his natural immune function to a degree. Missing a single pill will be bad for his body and once the worming treatment is over we will need to taper off the dose to give his body time to produce it’s own hormones etc again. Dogs pulled off steriods suddenly can die from adrenal failure.
My eating is a little better…though I wonder if my tum has grown smaller with the DS years rather than larger in a weird kind of way. I eat less than I did in year two without a doubt. I feel very full currently on little…but perhaps it is just because for the past few weeks I have made little effort to eat staying with protein rich fluids more often than not. This morning i forced myself to eat two eggs, a rasher of bacon and half slice of toast. I could not eat lunch I felt so stuffed, so I plumped for a fortified banana milk instead. Tonight I ate half a hamburger bun, 2 leaves of lettuce, a slice of tomato and a cheese covered burger patty. I wanted the handful of chips on the side but ate one and had a golfball feeling. So much for that!

I had my birthday on the 12th and it almost slipped past into an oblivion, if not for my family. My family bless them, spoiled me with so much love and tlc. I felt so close to them and thought how amazing they were in this raw grief to create in the middle of it all some celebration on my account. Reflecting on this, I realise somehow over the next weeks I have to turn this corner and start to truly count my blessings in a heartfelt way again. Not just for me but for all of us.

Vet just called his stool tests are negative for A Vasorum.

I want to feel relieved and do a happy dance but the fact is he shows possible clinical signs.

In a comparison of blood versus stool tests, only half the dogs tested positive for A vasorum via stool.

This is because the worm has a shedding cycle & if it is not shedding the stool can show up negative.

So - I still have to deworm. I’m praying the cough & bad skin is not related to A vasorum and that I can breathe a little easier. But I am not wholly convinced. Will see how the deworming goes. Fingers crossed.

As you can see by my tone today I am vascillating through angry moments. I’m caught up in this nightmare worm scenario I swear it’s like a bad sci-fi movie.

I sit daily for hours trying to make sense of this worm. Now Petal she was bold. She was up for a happy gourmet experience of frogs and slugs. It’s highly possible she got her A vasorum neat. Zen is more complex. He is a picky poodly. He’s not into gourmet ideas. He likes his food straight - sausages. Beef. Traditional British fare. No way would he eat a slug, a leaf, a frog even less. He does however love filthy water. I think he got it from doing this. If this is the case what’s to say A vasorum is not infesting Surreys boggy area’s…and water contamination is not a joke.

Randomly I found during my research an Aquatic supply shop talking about A vasorum in among the ads for pond food etc. It struck me as odd. I then found out Aquatic snails can carry the worm. Deep joy, I have a pond. The dogs both drank there at times. On the other hand - it could be your ordinary old garden slug. Or fox poo.

I spiral into possible things that threatened my dogs without me knowing. Who knows? We walked her near lakes and boggy streams all the time. The water though scares me as this might be how it is spreading? I don’t know, can’t find anything about it to verify my fears,  but I wish someone would care enough to find out if this is the case???  Needless to say in my angst after reading about water snails I have filled in the pond. I’d fill every lake and marsh & exterminate every slug and nail in Surrey if I could right now. Once I saw ponds and lakes as beautiful things good for dogs to play near and have fun, I saw slugs as pests but harmless - now I see them as infested killer pits of my own despair. How fast things have changed for me.

It’s tempting to poison every slug in sight and lay out the bait in the garden. However, this is not only futile in the bigger picture of A vasorum, it is also very dangerous. Probably more dogs in the UK die from snail bait poisoning than A Vasorum, a sobering thought to bear in mind.  I know slug poison containers often say they are safe around animals, but don’t be fooled. NO slug bait is safe around dogs and the smallest amount can kill a dog fast.

The best one can do is sweep up leaves and garden debris and drown the slugs in beer - yeeugh! Fill in ponds to avoid frogs and avoid attracting foxes into the garden. Research dewormers carefully, find a good preventative for your dogs. Advocate recently released a dewormer that might be effective but I still need to research that.  Stool test dogs regularly.  Don’t be fooled by the fact the dogs seem fine…look especially for things like dogs tiring on exercise faster than they used to. Look for things like dulling coats, loose stools that might come & go as in Petals case which I thought was allergy related. If they cough don’t waste time get them to the vets. Vomiting.  Bleeding disorders might also occur - too much bleeding from a cut or during minor surgery. If your dog seems to have lowered immune function - gets ear infections frequently or just seems off kilter. Test. All these are worth checking out properly. My dogs will now be stool tested 3 times a year at least even though it is not greatly accurate along with recieving preventative care.

Zenni went on the dewormer Panacur on Friday but had a violent cough gag on Saturday. I decided he was high risk and it looked like a bad reaction to me. Stopped the panacur. Brick & hard place stuff. I don’t treat him, he will die. I do treat him and he may die anyway. What to do?

Call his vet this morning. Want to make a plan - a kind of here’s what we will do if his breathing shuts down???? After Petal’s death I have to know I am doing all I can plus some. I know Zen is at risk, if the worms create antigens, if they form embolisms, we are in big trouble. He has a BAD heart murmer which SHE diagnosed. Tell her this on the phone, she clearly thinks I am completely over reacting here. He’ll be okay - I must have confused the possible side effects with the immitis strain. It’s a lungworm really not a heartworm like the US one. I know that but what she doesn’t know is it’s not just your bog standard old lungworm. If she’d held Petal in the final hours she’d know that. Still, I doubt myself substansially & I don’t argue. She’s a nice person, don’t get me wrong and I know I am a difficult customer right now. I’m every vets nightmare really, but I have good reason to be. After the call I go back to my collection of researched papers on shitty worm Angiostrongylus Vasorum. Check if I have it right…I have. I can’t play around. Have a panic episode as I don’t know what to do. I spiral and drink three cups of tea in a row then think I might start chucking from pure stress.

Pete remembers we spoke to a very nice Vet, as a complete stranger on the day of Petals death. Go to see him Zenni in arm. Nice guy - best of all OPEN MIND. We arrive, he has already been researching…gives us a paper regarding A.Vasorum. Instantly knows of treatment problems. Swear I could almost hug him for that. Listens to Zens heart. His eyes go up bigtime - I know I say - it’s bad stuff. He says the problem is grade 5 or 6, really bad. I ask if he reckons we are in a risky space here regarding Zen. He is as realistic as me - yup - it’s risky. He must have seen my face falling because he added that Zen has strong lungs. It’s like a tiny glimmer of hope. A glimmer is good right now I’ll hold on to that.

Meanwhile, Poochi is doing a good job of being cute as hell, sits like a good boy and noodles up against Vet’s leg shooting him the lurve-look - doggie language going on. He is saying ‘ Mr Vet you are MY man!’ - I had to laugh. Zenni bless him is a sissy and a flirt!

We discuss his worming plan and we discuss the wormers his practice uses. He questions if the dewormer he has his clients on is safe after we tell him we dewormed our dogs like clockwork. Takes me to the storeroom and we read the brochure in the box. ‘Prevents against the immitis heartworm it says’. We stand there silently. I’m flashing through all the times I dewormed my dogs USELESSLY. THINKING WE WERE SAFE. Yep, right. Its sooooo misleading - on both boxes (the one I give my dogs and his recommended brand) on the box is listed prevents heartworm. What it does not say is what type of heartworm. That’s in the teeny tiny inside blurb. And like most of us in the UK even know there are different types of heartworm. Mr Vet looks at me, I look at him pennies dropping. I just say gently that it is going to be best for his practice to find one that does work against A vasorum. He seems up for it. I tell him I think it’s not so low risk - I have read two reports stating it is endemic in the South East. That I fear we just don’t know how many dogs are actually dying from it - I mean plenty of dogs do die from unknown respiritory causes, epilepsy, heart condition. He gets me.

Mr Vet is an honest man. He’s not treated A Vasorum before. No problem he is going to learn tonight - will help me work a plan to try to diminish risks with Zen Zen. I’m fine with this - give me a learner with a smart mind anyday over someone who doesn’t want to learn and knows little anyways. We play around with possibilities: to put on steriods or not, to consider antihistimines or not - and agree to resume treatment on Wednesday. We discuss the what’s if of Zen going into a trauma. I know the plan - we go two ways. If it is too severe we put my boysie down. If we think he could swing aroung…IV, cortisone, antihistimine, oxygen,??? fast action. Zen will guide me.

My psychic heart just thumps kind of dully since Petally died. I have little verve and now facing this with Zen, I feel bitter. I do. And I am not a bitter person - nor much of a WHY me? type - but suddenly I am. I know my boy has a 50% chance and I might be very optimistic. Poor little guy, he’s got pure good karma. It’s just unfair.

We buy him a ball at the vets. He is so sublimely happy and I think how little it takes to make a dog happy. I think maybe I will take him out for more walks before we start treatment and feed him the best food and do what I can to give him TOP LIFE, while I still can. Okay - in case he dies. He cuddles against me for the ride home and keeps looking at me with that ‘what’s up mum look?’ I cry. Again. Thousandth time this week. I tell him we have to be strong. Think he knows how I am feeling, he cocks his head and listens to my mad ramblings intensely. Then I get little feathery licks on my hands as the tears fall.

And my DS? I can’t cut it right now. My eating is appalling and my bones are jutting. This DS is not a good mix with stress of any kind. And the truth is I actually don’t care. I just don’t. Think depression is biting me hard.

Pete woke up this morning. ‘I had a dream’ he says - ‘worms were eating my brain’.

I don’t know what to say so I just lie there and stroke and hold his hand and wish I could lift Petally up off the floor and put her back in his arms and say ‘babes it’s only a foul nightmare - see here she is….silly billy!’.

Worms have eaten our heart, our dogs hearts, and in our dreams and waking life worms possess us.

It’s nasty.

The above pictures are me with Petal as a pup. I just fell for her hook line and sinker. She opened my heart up right from the very day I first saw her. Instant love! The pics that follow are me with my gorgeous dogs on a happy Christmas day last year. Please note I don’t usually dress like this but I was wearing ALL my new chrimbo clothes and jewels right down to the gloves and boots! Also I seldom post pics of myself nowadays as it’s still like I don’t recognise myself after losing 145 pounds! In one of these pics I am trying to lift my Petally, note my buckling legs lol - she weighed a ton but I would carry her forever in my arms if I could only have her back. My squiffy poochy Zenni (last pic) is currently holding me together, bless his little poodly heart.

I can hardly look at the pictures below right now because I just split my heart everytime . Some like the one of her recently smiling full frontal, and the one of her leaping into the air, and the baby puppy one where she gives the soft toy tiger a look to the side are permanently etched on my brain. I cannot get over this loss right now, the loss of her warm little body, the loss of her presence, the loss of days spent in delight of her progress and just the loss of the astonishing joy-energy Petal was. I am so depleted in my heart right now & sick with sadness. Sorry to go on so - but this is the way I deal with myself when things hit me - by becoming a wreck basically! Here is the photo gallery that shows more pics of our stunning loveable dog: http://mssint.com/petal/

Update: Our Petal was autopsied and found to have Heartworm or Angiostrongylus in her brain & other organs. This is apparently rare although Surrey is known as a ‘hotspot’. Most dogs can be saved if it is caught early enough. Don’t rely on the fact that you regularly deworm your dogs, we do too. Although this is very important for other parasites, some brands don’t prevent infestation. Unfortunately these are the brands you vet will likely prescribe for you - Stronghold and Drontal WILL NOT PROTECT YOUR DOG against Angiostrongylus. Be aware of this. There is not one type of dewormer as far as I am aware that will prevent and kill of all types of worms. You will not see this worm in your dogs stool as you will many other types of worms. I’m still researching the best way forward for future deworming of my pets, having discovered that stronghold was absolutely useless in Petals case. Snails,(both land and aquatic) Slugs, Foxes and Frogs carry the most common form of the disease. (We presume Petal has the vasorum type but there are other types too - rats carry a form of it). If your pet drinks dirty water or has a habit of snail crunching and gets ill: exercise intolerence, coughing, vomiting etc please think of this when you see your vet. In fact think of it anyway even if your dog drinks foul water or has eaten a snail or slugs or had contact with frogs. (I caught Petal chasing hapless frogs in the garden before and my husband mentioned to the vet that she had been found licking a dead one.) I don’t mean to alarm anyone, dogs can possibly live quite a long time with this worm (though eventually it will cause death ), and with the ear infection Petals defence’s were low, but please don’t go through our kind of grief - read about it on the link below and know the symptoms and the treatments. A simple stool test may test positive(but is not guarenteed by any means) and at the very least your vet will be alerted that you are aware of this parasite. Do not let your vet prescribe high dose dewormers for treatment without planning a strategy for your dog that takes into consideration overall health and your dogs weight and age. Deworming Angiostrongylus is not simple… if the worms die suddenly they can cause fatal toxicity via antigen release. They can also form embolisms. Please be careful and research this. Some vets will try to reassure you this is just a lungworm and easy to treat…confusion reigns. It’s not easy to treat if you are not aware of possible side effects of the worms themselves. For more information regarding this virulent life threatening parasite see these links:

http://www.heartwormsociety.org/

 http://www.newmaldenvets.com/advice/caring-for-your-pet#lungworm

http://www.blackwell-synergy.com/doi/abs/10.1111/j.1748-5827.2004.tb00261.x?journalCode=jsap

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15664523

http://www.blackwell-synergy.com/doi/abs/10.1111/j.1748-5827.2005.tb00300.x

http://www.rvc.ac.uk/AboutUs/Staff/kchandler/Publications.cfm

http://forums.pigeonwatch.co.uk/forums/index.php?act=ST&f=13&t=25895

http://forum.petmeds.co.uk/archive/index.php/t-356.html

We are having Zen our other dog, tested today and are most concerned as Zen has been coughing for an age and despite trying to find the cause (we have had ECG’s & x-ray of his oesophagus done quite recently, but no problems detected except quite a strong heart murmur which is now worrying me.) He was in great health a while ago but his coat looks suddenly dull and sparse (I noticed Petals coat go dull quickly too) so I don’t feel very positive. He coughed through the night and I hear his stool test will take several days before we will know if he tests positive. In the meantime Zen is not on a preventative measure. I called and spoke to the Vets nurse yesterday, asked if I could do anything to prevent the worms progressing like use his regular dewormer? She said to use his regular dewormer, but I have not done so as I fear it may prevent proper treatment (medicine interactions scare me as we thought this might be the case with Petally.). So fear is my middle name today. I feel I might be sitting on a timebomb and am taking further steps today to find out if there is anything I can do for my Zenni interim. Please if you have a moment send thoughts, vibes, prayers for his safety as the treatment in itself carries a risk of death.

UPDATE: I discovered after writing the above that his regular dewormer would not protect him in anyway & I have edited the bit on Petal to include warnings about this. After speaking with his vet she prescribed panacur for him. After Zen had one dose of panacur he became very ill the following day with extreme gag-coughing. I stopped immediately and called her to express my concerns about both the fact that he is a tiny dog with a grade 6 heart murmur and of the worms potentially causing big trouble. She told me to put him back on the panacur and that this was just lungworm. Mmmmm…. I did not agree.

He is currently with a vet who took the time out to research and protect my dog as best he can. We are deworming with panacur and a steriod to hopefully prevent antigen side effects at a very low dose. The panacur dose is quarter that prescribed by the original vet but it is being given over 21 days instead of seven. He is 4 days into treatment as from today 23/04 and so far he seems fine. He did cough a bit more than usual today but I am expecting that and it has not been severe, just a little more often. He is eating and drinking well.

This is not my ordinary blog but in my blog I tell of not just my DS challenges but also my life challenges.

I’m sitting here reeling from shock still and feel as though my heart has been pulverised. I have cried all day. I cannot believe our little doggle Petal is gone. All of 10 months old.

She had an ear infection last week and we took her to the Vet. She inspected her and gave her an antibiotic injection and a pain relief drug. Also otomaxdrops to treat the ear infection. She came home and was very ill but otherwise fine. Nothing like an ear infection to make a dog not it’s usual self. We gave her lot’s of TLC, but some days later she was still in pain. We called the vet who prescribe a drug called rimadyl, a painkiller. She seemed perkier after her first dose. The next few days she seemed to level out. I’d not say she made great progress, but she was not regressing.

She was bought a new toy yesterday and played with it a while which we thought was great. She picked at dinner, so later on I gave her milk. But in the late night she was restless and seemed to be in pain. Pete put her in our bed and lay with her in his arms. At 2 am she started to vomit and fellout of the bed. She vomited several times. Pete woke me up at 5.30 and asked me to come and see what I thought. It was clear she was in a very bad way. She was weak, disorientated, vomited again and appeared lethargic. She had her first seizure. We put her in the car and took her to the emergency vet. She had several seizures in my arms as we drove her there.

The vet told us her other ear was perforated. This came as a suprise as we had not been told of this on our initial visit. She could not confirm if she had perforation of the ear that we had been treating with otomax as it was covered in black gunk. She put her on oxygen, diazapam, a painkiller & IV fluids. By now her problem was clearly neurological. The plan was we would see the neurologist if when they tried to wean her off the diazapam she was not improved. We came home and sat her in a numb funk waiting for the call so that we could prepare to take her to the neurologist. The call came but to our shock & horror the vet told us Petal had died.

I cannot describe our anguish. We researched rimadyl on the internet and found that it has killed many dogs in the US. Pfizer was involved in a huge court case about it several years ago. They settled with the owners out of court and the drug is still on the market. I do not know if this caused our Petals death, (many more dogs seem to do very well on it with no effects)but the symptoms of the other dogs that died are eerily similar. Weakness in the legs, vomiting, dilated pupils, seizures etc. Eventually death. Otomax should also not be prescribed if the eardrum is perforated as it can apparently cause side effects. But this is very very rare indeed, and on normal ears,again it works very well. I’ve used it in the past on other dogs before and it cleared ears very well. It may be that our Petal simply went into shock from severe middle ear infection, maybe encephalitis was caused or did she have an underlying dormant condition?. I also wonder if Petal fell out of the bed and damaged herself …my mind tries to think of everything and anything that might have caused this tragedy. It could be anything really I don’t know, this is the worst part - the not knowing and the shock of it all.All I can say is had we known of the possibilities with both otomax(on perforated eardrums) and rimydal I would not have given them to Petal.Even though it might be they are not to blame at all, imo we should have still been informed of her perforations and of the fact that rimadyl does carry a warning of possible death on it’s info sheet which we never saw. This way we could have made an informed choice and weighed up risks with our vet.

We are desperately sad, shocked and gutted. We took in a seemingly healthy vibrant pup last week, she was full of life and energy. Now she is dead her heart having stopped. When the vet tried to put a tube down to save her blood was present in the tube.

My DS has fallen by the wayside today. I cannot eat and cannot rest. I see my girl’s details in my mind over and over again. The gentlest brown eyes. The spirit and curiosity of her. The absolute love and trust. I see the little seam on her bully tummy - always reminded me of an open WLS cut only it is a godmade thing all bullterriers have. Her bed and toys are as we left them this am. I can’t gather the courage to put them away.

We only had her for 10 months but what a special girl she was. Bright, super exceptionally intelligent, incredibly gentle and loving. She filled our days with light and such joy. I’ll never forget her presence. Not ever. She was my and Pete’s and the children’s baby - we adored her.

I’ll not be posting further this week. I need time to try to make sense of what feels like a bad blow to the very heart of me.

R.I.P my Petally. You really were a Petal after all - a beautiful petal floating to the earth on a gentle breeze, for only a short transient time. XxxXX