The Senakams | Corgi + 3

Bryson Update- "home sweet home"

At last! Bryson is back!! Adios, hospital, hope I never see you again! 

 
We got the call in the middle this morning that we've been desperately waiting for- that he finally turned the corner last night, with his fever subsided, his electrolytes normal again, and his chest x-ray showing that his pneumonia is responding to the antibiotics- it's time to go home!

I was sooooo excited as I drove to the hospital to pick him up, it rivals the day we took him home from the breeder some 3+ years ago. And he knew he's going home too. As soon as we slipped his regular collar and leash on, he pulled so hard towards the door he almost yanked my arm out of its socket. Just look at that huge smile on his face :)

I can't tell you how relieved we are that we finally have our boy home. He zonked out almost as soon as we walked through the door (he's snoring next to me right now...). Can't blame him, even though he was stuck in this hospital cage all day, it must have been hard to rest when there's 24/7 action going on around you. I had to wake him up for this picture under the "welcome home" banner I made for him (you know, Eva had a banner, so he now has his own too), which he evidently wasn't too happy about...

So, what's the final diagnosis? The internist seems to think that he must have been really stressed when he had his bout of giardia a few weeks ago (don't ever let your dog drink stream water!), even though he was treated adequately with antibiotics and double-dosed on his steroids, that his Addison's rendered him unable to deal with that extra stress and developed ulcers in his stomach. She believed the electrolyte changes are consistent with the vomiting ("3rd spacing") and nothing to do with his Percorten dose, and the pneumonia as we have speculated was due to aspiration of the vomitus into his lungs.

We still have at least 2 weeks' worth of antibiotics to finish off at home, a follow-up chest x-ray, and a whole new regimen of steroid dosing that will help us better cover him during stressful times. Oh, and life-long Pepcid to protect his stomach (coz higher doses of steroids can precipitate ulcers). Oh steroid, steroid, you're such a double-edged sword- too little, he gets bleeding ulcers, too much, he gets bleeding ulcers. A necessary evil, I guess.

At least he's looking much better, other than being real tired, he almost looks like his old self again.

And now we've got to deal with the aftermath- the hefty vet bill. We do have VPI insurance, which we bought before he was diagnosed with Addison's. I've always thought that even though it doesn't cover everyday garden-variety pet expenses that well, that it'll "save" us during catastrophic events. Well, looks like that isn't the case either. I looked at our coverage yesterday, and looks like we'll be lucky if we get our premium back. Why get pet insurance when it doesn't really protect you on rainy days?

Anyway, insurance or not, we'd have treated him with whatever it takes. Our furry kids really are like our real kids- I've always known that in my head, but now I really feel it in my heart.

We went out for a nice, short walk at Point Isabel this evening, the weather was warm and the family is back together. I can't be more thankful.

 

Bryson Hospitalization Update- "definitely not going home today"

It's been an exhausting weekend running on adrenaline and caffeine, but all the good thoughts and energy you're sending is definitely keeping our (and hopefully Bryson's) spirit up :)

We got a report from his vet this morning, it's sort of a good-news-bad-news kinda day...

The good news is that his vomiting has stopped, and he's able to keep down some baby food and water (they said he "took all the food offered"- which made me smile, that sounds like our boy alright). Also, they ordered an abdominal ultrasound (that costs a whopping $600) to rule out any obstruction they couldn't see on x-ray, and good news is that it did come back all clear.

Just as I was getting hopeful, they delivered the bad news- his spiked another fever this morning despite of antibiotics started yesterday for his pneumonia. It's not abnormal to take 1-2 days for him to start responding, but they need to see his temperature normal for 24 hours before they would let him go home, which crushed any hope that he'll be coming home today. I almost bursted in tears when I got that news...

The hope is that his fever will come down by tomorrow, and if that happens and his repeat chest xray shows signs of improvement, and he can continue to keep down food and his oral meds, then he will be cleared for discharge tomorrow.

I'm discouraged that he isn't coming home today, but I'm keeping hopes up that this positive course is what he'll take in the next 24 hours.

Please continue to keep Bryson in your thoughts! I'm saving all his fan mails and will show him all the love he's been getting when he comes home :)

Bryson Hospitalization Update- "it's perplexing"

Thanks everyone for your well wishes for Bryson! I wish I'm here to tell you he's all better and is snuggling up to my feet right now, but as you can tell from the subject of this post, the vet is still scratching his head trying to come up with an answer, while Bryson is stuck in his hospital cage room.

We visited him last night and this morning at this hospital, he looked so hopeful to see us, he perked up right away, probably thought he's going to come home with us and have a nice dinner (he's on strict bowel rest, aka no food no water, poor boy...).

This morning he didn't look quite as chipper, the doctor attributes it to some pain meds that they gave him just before we saw him. He was so lethargic he couldn't even greet us. To add insult to injury, he also had the "cone of shame" on (he was picking at his IV cath). It pains me to hear that he has no prospect of coming home today, and even tomorrow doesn't look that promosing... 

Which brings us to the mystery of what's really going on. Well, the good news is he's stopped vomiting. The bad news is he's developed a nasty case of pneumonia overnight (or at least what they think is pneumonia given x-ray findings and a new fever, potentially caused by him aspirating his own bloody vomit at one point into his lung). That is in addition to still not knowing why he was throwing up blood to begin with and some mysteries in his lab tests. His blood tests show that he's not in an Addisonian crisis (which is good), but his potassium keeps dropping even after he's stopped vomiting for a while and he has a low specific gravity in his urine (no, not because he has short stubby legs as hubby said, it means his kidneys aren't concentrating his urine). They're leaning towards attributing that to an OD of Percorten (which I find perplexing, given that he's always had the same dose of Percorten, and he's had the last dose almost 3 weeks ago). Either way, the pieces just don't seem to be fitting quite right in this picture...

All they can do right now is treating his lung situation assuming it is aspiration pneumonia with antibiotics, protecting his stomach (which means no oral steroid for his Addison's, which I understand but still makes me nervous), and slowly introducing water, then food. The immediate goals are (1) to see him being able to keep down some water, food and oral medicine, (2) normalize his electrolytes (by supplements and holding Percorten, but we may not find out what the underlying problem is), and (3) seeing improvement in his presumed pneumonia (on x-rays and by symptoms). And this is just to get him stablized enough to get discharged, after which there will probably be numerous outpatient visits to follow up and figure out why all these are happening.

I know the hospital is the best place for him to be right now, I just hate that unsettled feeling that we don't know what's really going on, that he's all alone at this hospital, and that we won't be able to have him home anytime soon.

Oh Bryson, we miss you so, so much. I really hope we'll be able to pull our little human brains together and figure out what's wrong so we can help you feel better soon. Hang in there, buddy.

Bryson's Admitted to the Hospital

We had a major setback in Bryson's health yesterday- he threw up blood all over the place just as we were getting ready to go to sleep. And we're not talking blood-tinged vomitus, we're talking a mostly bloody fluid, lots and lots of it... After half an hour of retching and relentless vomiting, we decided it was enough and we took him to a nearby vet ER.

Many tests, some sub-Q fluid and $500+ later, he came home at 3 a.m. with instructions to rest, eat a bland diet and go back to our regular vet if he keeps vomiting. He slept through the rest of the morning, and even though he looked exhausted, I thought we're outta the woods. But of course things can't be that easy- after a light breakfast of a tablespoonful of cottage cheese and water, he vomited more blood spectacularly all over the place. He looked deathly sick at this point, and we rushed him back to the hospital (actually we took him to his regular vet who sent us to the ER vet right away).

This time, they took one look at him and said in the most "please don't freak out" way that he needs to be admitted to the hospital. I was there alone with Bryson (hubby had to stay home with Eva), and I just couldn't hold back tears as I handed over Bryson to the vet and had to deal with the fact that I had to leave without him...

I've been back and forth between home and the hospital all day, alternately checking on things at home and signing consent/checking lab results/idling at the hospital waiting around for stuff to happen... They're still working him up as of right now. They're able to rule out a few things, but that darn lab machine broke just at the right time and we couldn't get his electrolytes (the one thing that will tell us if he's in an Addisonian crisis). They said they're fixing it now, which means more waiting...

We're all exhausted (except for Eva, who napped for 3+ hrs, bless her heart), and we're about to round up everyone and go back to the hospital one more time to get the electrolyte results, and to deliver Bryson's personal items (a toy and maybe a pillow thingy), which hopefully will help him feel a bit more comfortable there tonight. They said we could visit him in this "room", I can't wait to give him a big hug and lots of kisses and tell him to feel better soon.

I'm hoping we'll find out more soon. We'll keep you all posted when we do. Please keep your fingers crossed for us.

Bryson as Mr. March! (and a resolution for his health)

Thanks to your generous support, Bryson's made it to the 2011 Corgis (with Blogs) Calendar as Mr. March, yay!

And check out the cover boy, Gibson, whose mommy Kelly is the mastermind behind this project. If you go through her blog, you can see how much work she's put in to the creation of this calendar- and she isn't making a dime from it- 100% of the profits go to corgi rescue. What a way to give back to the corgi community. You go, Kelly!

But to be perfectly honest, it is not without some mixed emotions as I look at Bryson as Mr. March in this calendar...

As some of you know, Bryson has been diagnosed with Addison's Disease for a little over a year now, just before Eva was born. It must have been such a tumultuous year for him- being demoted in the pack, having to deal with a condition where you have no ability to fight off stress (a baby in the house probably doesn't help with that), and despite being constantly medicated having flare-up's every so often that results in spectacular episodes of bloody diarrhea (not pretty, definitely not calendar material).

Below is the Percoten shot I have to give him every 25 days, it's a subcutaneous injection (just under the skin) between his shoulder blades. Without this he wouldn't be able to regulate his electrolytes, and he could die from it (as he almost did last year). In addition, we give him a daily dose of prednisone to simulate the body's normal response to stress. But since we can't always predict what stressful event happen in the day, it seems like we're always playing catch up.

 

As I looked over his photos this past year while choosing ones to submit to the calendar, I was shocked when I realize I hadn't noticed (a) we have so few pictures of him (Eva is a show-stealer); and (b) he looks like he has aged 10 years in this short year. This is when I realize this disease has really taken a toll on him, and I felt so guilty that we hadn't spent more time helping him get healthier this past year... I bawled my eyes out while scratching his head next to my feet.

So, over this past holiday weekend, I've made a resolution to myself and to Bryson, that this coming year we'll try our best to do whatever it takes to get him back on the healthy path again.

I started by finally making him an appointment to this naturopathic vet that our neighbor recommended. I know, it sounds hocus pocus, but I'm a firm believer (being a pharmacist) that there are limitations in allopathic ("regular") medicine, especially when it comes to these chronic immune-related diseases that there's so little it can offer other than treating its symptoms. Don't get me wrong, I don't believe in ditching his life-saving medicines, but I do believe that there are other ways that you can help coax the body to restore (or at least move towards) its balance. Sounds philosophical, but reading Dr. Pitcairn's New Complete Guide to Natural Health for Dogs and Cats (he's considered the grandfather of naturopathic veterinarian medicine), it helps me understand small changes in their lifestyle can amount to big improvements in their health.

This naturopathic vet is so popular (I think someone in her practice consults with the Oakland Zoo), that our first appointment isn't till October. They told me to prepare for a review of history at this first visit, and potentially treatment at the time if deemed appropriate, which could include *gasp* doggie acupuncture *gasp*. I'd love to tell you how that goes and have a picture of Bryson the pincushion posted on the blog when it happens. And that one probably won't make the calendar, either.

Wish us luck! 

Vote for Bryson!

Guess what, Bryson made it as one of the 30 semi-finalists for the 2011 calendar contest over at Gibson's blog, and voting is now on for the final 12! So you know what I'm gonna ask you to do....

Yes! Please vote for Bryson right here by leaving a comment by Sept 7, telling them that the calendar will not be complete without his handsome mug you'd like to vote for No. 16 and No. 18.

Bryson thank you for your support!!