The B.A.R.F. Blog

Riley Has Passed On

2010-02-08T22:56:00.000-05:00

Henry On His Walk

2009-02-21T19:10:00.001-05:00

Henry is such a good walker, always stays right by my side. =) A great ambassadog for greyhounds!

A General Update

2009-01-01T18:49:00.008-05:00

Hi everyone, sorry to have been AWOL. Thought I'd give everyone a general update. Henry lost a declaw a couple weeks ago. It started out that it was loose, I called the Vet and she said wrap it (not too tight) and hopefully it will callous over. Henry managed to get his vet wrap off when I was not looking, and ended up amputating the dewclaw by himself 95%. By this time it was late evening and my husband was at work, and had the van (our only vehicle) and we were in the middle of a blizzard. I called the vet, and she said if you can pull it off cleanly without traumatizing him, do it. Otherwise see if he can get it off the rest of the way himself. So I waited to see if Henry could get the rest of the dewclaw off himself. He would lick his dewclaw gently, but that was it. Henry started to pant and have Focal seizures from the stress and pain. I gave him an extra grain of Phenobarbital per the Vet's instructions. I then managed to cleanly pull the dewclaw off. Fortunately it came off with ease as it was barely hanging on. I put Neosporin on the area and gently wrapped it in gauze and vetwrap and right away Henry felt alot better. I put him on Cephalexin (antibiotic) as a pre-caution. I am happy to say this antibiotic caused absolutely no problems with Henry's epilepsy, unlike Flagyl, another antibiotic.

By the way, Henry is 88 days Grand-Mal free today!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

2008-10-10T18:58:00.001-04:00

Just so ya'll know, I have been doing most of my posting over at Healthy Houndz lately.

Latest Entry At Healthy Hounds

2008-10-08T11:45:00.000-04:00

Seizure Monster

Valium Is Our Best Friend Today

2008-10-05T22:46:00.003-04:00

A little after 10 pm, Henry started up with the panting again. I knew what was coming. Next would have been crying, and them trembling, and then BOOM, another Grand-Mal. I'm not taking any chances. I gave Henry one dose of rectal Valium at 10:30pm. I was going to dose him per vet's instructions within 30 minutes if pre-seizure behavior did not stop. About 10 minutes after administering the rectal Valium, the panting stopped. Thank goodness for Valium!

I think I may have to keep him drugged up on Valium until his regular meds begin to take effect. Hopefully within 3 days the Phenobarbital will be kicking in.

An Update~

2008-10-05T18:27:00.009-04:00

Henry is doing alot better. He is still on the bed and hasn't left it since we got home from the vet this morning around 11am. He is awake, and looking around. No more panting, crying or shivering. He seems unsure. Probably a mix of fear of ever going through that nightmare again, and also the meds probably have him a little loopy.

I'll gladly take loopy over what he was like before we went to the vet, and I'm sure Henry agrees.

In the next few weeks, the side effects of his seizure meds will be at their worst. And as the medicine begins to really take effect, and do it's job at it's best, the side effects will not be as strong become alot more bearable.

A few side effects I expect:

~extreme hunger

~ataxia in rear legs

~extra thirst, that one will stay.

~incontinence.

Within about 1-4 months, there will be improvement both in less side effects and less seizures.

If Henry begins his panting, crying and shivering again, I am going to give him a Valium right then rather than wait until he seizes.

I had never seen him on Valium before, and I really like how it almost instantly cured the panting, crying and shivering, and best of all, stopped the cluster!

You all know I tend to be anti-drug, but sometimes it just really isn't a choice to go without. I'm still going to do all I can in giving Henry the best diet and everything else. I believe it all plays a part and Henry needs ALL the help he can get.

Maybe the drugs will shorten his life in the long run, or maybe they won't, but I sincerely believe the drugs saved his life and he would be dead right now if it were not for drugs.

Home From Vet After a Cluster Of 5 Grand-Mals

2008-10-05T10:38:00.000-04:00

Henry had 5 Grand-Mals in the last day and a half. The last two were only an hour and a half apart. We rushed to the vet. The vet gave Henry a hefty shot of valium and he is out of it at the moment. Medication right now that we are trying is

1 1/2 1 grain phenobarb pills twice daily

250 mg/ml potassium bromide 2ml twice daily <--the vet says that one just for awhile, then wean Henry off that later when pheno is doing the job.

Milk thistle 150 mg. Forgot to ask if this was once daily or twice daily. Will get that at health food store

Rectal valium as needed.

Continuing with homecooked.

We are all feeling pretty fried over here. I hope Henry never has to go through that ever again.

Henry is just one of those really severe epilepsy cases, and he needs ALL the help he can get, both in conventional meds, natural meds, and homecooked diet.

I really, really tried to go with no meds. For Henry it just can't be done.

What May Have Been The Trigger

2008-10-04T20:28:00.002-04:00

To celebrate Henry's 1 month anniversary of no seizures, I made him meatloaf muffins. Henry is very sensitive to chicken. Pets who are sensitive to chicken, it turns out are often sensitive to eggs. The combo of Henry being out of alignment, and the eggs he had on both Sept. 29th and Sept. 31st led to the two cluster seizures of the last 24 hours.

*feeling a major guilt trip*

=(

2008-10-04T17:24:00.008-04:00

Henry broke his 35 day streak and seized last night at 10:20 pm. It was so severe I was not able to apply ice pack as he was flying all over. I have bruises and a gazillion scratches on my inner left calf from when I was trying to stop his head from banging the wall so hard. It sounded like a jackhammer in our bedroom. I imagine Henry's head is sore today. The post-ictal was TERRIBLE. Henry cried all night. I sang our special song to him softly over and over and kept him cool and did occular compression and took him for a walk around the block at 2 am. He slept in our bed, which he NEVER does when we are in the bed.

He was post-ictal still when we woke. He was finally resting comfortably at about 4:30 pm, and at 5:10, he went into another Grand-Mal. This time, while it was still bad, it wasn't like last nights and I was able to apply the ice-pack which helped tremendously. Henry is walking around the house a little bit. He's nowhere near as bad as he was last night. Let's hope the worst is over.

Not a good day for Henry. =(

UPDATE: Henry received an emergency chiropractic adjustement this evening. He was pretty far out of alignment.

UPDATE #2: Chiropractor did warn me, that since Henry was so out of alignment, he may once again get worse before better. So we had a nagging fear Henry may seize one more time. And he did, at 9pm. This one milder than the last two, and extra short thanks to ice pack. In the ten minutes before the last Grand-mal started, Henry started crying and trembling and panting. Then in the 30 seconds prior to it starting, he got up from next to me on the sofa, walked over to his nest bed, and fell over stiff right before he made it. I flew for ice-pack and was able to stop it pretty quick.

You know, with each Grand-Mal. He empties his bowels out more. Hopefully he has all that egg out now. (read above post about trigger)

One Month Of NO Grand-Mals!!! Woo Hooo!!!!!!!

2008-09-30T18:16:00.002-04:00

Hi everybuddy! I know my Mommy was supposed to post pikshurs of my speshul day yesterday, but I noticed she stills has not done that, so I am taking matters into my own paws and telling you about my speshul day myself! Yesterday, we celebrated that I finally made I one full month with NO Grand-Mals! Here are some pikshurs of how my day went~

First, (after my homecooked breakfast of course) I take my usual looong nap, while the hoomans get homeskool done. My Mommy says this is the nice thing about greyhounds, we sleep alot.

After homeskool all done, Mommy put a speshul bandana on me to help signify my speshul day, and we all went to the State Park. (All except our kitty. She doesn't care for that stuff)

Then, we went home and had a party! Mommy made beef carrot muffins with peanut butter zucchini frosting topped with a dollop of yogurt and a strawberry. Both me and my extra furry brother got one. They were YUMMY!

Do not worry, the choklat syrup is for the hoomans. I know choklat VEWY bad for houndies!

And that is how my day went! =)

Someone Asked~Which Helped Most, Chiropractic Or Homecooked?

2008-09-30T18:09:00.003-04:00

Someone on the Epil-K e-mail list asked me which I thought helped Henry more in finally being able to reach one full month of no Grand-Mals. I am sharing my answer with all of you~

The diet started first, and he started showing improvement then. The only reason he seized while on the diet was because I tried to change out the steak for chicken. I now know that chicken is a no no for Henry.
Then we started chiropractic, and he had the expected seizures that go with the first adjustment. That was a nightmare. If we did not know of the ice pack trick, I think Henry might have gone into status epileptus that night. (sp.?)
Now that Henry has had several chiropractic adjustments and is doing well with holding his adjustments, I think that is helping him stay seizure free.
Last week, he ate about 1 cup of kitty kibble, that had chicken in it. I was very worried, but, he did not have a Grand-Mal, just a few very mild flycatcher focals that evening. I am quite sure chiropractic is why Henry did not have a Grand-Mal in reaction to the chicken that day. I am continuing homecooked and no chicken regardless.

In Loving Memory Of Alfalfa

2008-09-27T20:17:00.020-04:00

Today is one year since my dear Alfalfa passed on. I have yet to write a memorial for him, so this my first. It's something that just really hurts to talk about, but I think once I do it, I will finally feel better. I want everyone to know what a great dog he was, and how blessed I was to have a dog like him.

So I'm just going to start at the beginning. Alfalfa came into the shelter one day, with the man who had saved his life. (I worked at this shelter) The man came in, holding Alfalfa (still a pup) in his arms, and looked all through our kennels. He then walked up to one of the staff, and tears proceeded to stream down his cheeks, as he told the staff member how he had found the pup.

He was pumping gas one day, and heard crying. He looked around, and he saw Alfalfa, a little teeny baby, nearly starved to death, too young to be away from Mama, all curled up and near death. The man picked up the pup, and took him to the vet asap. Alfalfa stayed at the vet until he was well enough, and then the man took Alalfa to his trailer and named him Petro, after the gas station he found him at. (sometimes I think I should have kept that name, seeing as to how it signified the story)

Anyways, the trailer this man lived in, was the kind you pull behind your truck. It was itty bitty and the man was a traveling man. As Alfalfa grew, the man felt selfish by keeping Alfalfa when he had no big yard and etc. Alfalfa was a pointer mix, and yes, he was VERY high energy.

So the man drove from shelter to shelter, trying to find a shelter he felt comfortable leaving Alalfa at. He went to many, many shelters, and he was not comfortable with any of them.

Until one day he came to our shelter, and he knew it was time. We never saw a man cry so hard about giving up his pup. He very sincerely loved Alfalfa, and I am sure to this day that man wonders about Alfalfa. I always wonder if somehow I'll cross paths with that man. That man poured alot of love into Alfalfa.

Alfalfa was really sad when the man left him. All the shelter staff fell in love with Alfalfa right away. It was decided we would do whatever it takes to find this pup a home, and that this pup would NOT be euthanized like many others unfortunately were.

Alfalfa was at the shelter for SIX months. Noone wanted him. I suspect it was his tail, it curled up. I think that put people off and they didn't give him a chance. If that's the reason, I am really GLAD he had that tail, or I might have missed out on the World's Greatest Dog. The staff were bugging me for quite some time to take Alfalfa home with me. I was trying to avoid having dogs as I was in a relationship I needed to get out of. They all cheered when I finally decided to take Alfalfa home.

Anyways, we had some great times. He LOVED water. I would go swimming with him regularly when warm enough. The happiest moments in my life were when I was in the water with Alfalfa. He was my best friend.

A month after I adopted Alfalfa, I brought home Riley, for JUST the weekend, cause he had been at the shelter for several months and needed a break. Riley and Alfalfa were good playmates before I brought Alfalfa home, and they were thrilled to see each other again. I took Riley back to the shelter the following Monday, and Alfalfa slunk into a deep depression, just like when the man left him. So at 3 am, me and Alfalfa went to the shelter and picked up Riley to come home with us for good! I left a note on the desk so my coworkers would know why Riley was missing. They just laughed.

I mentioned earlier that I was in a bad relationship at the time when I adopted Alfalfa. When this man would lift a hand to me, Alfalfa would stand between us. You could tell he was afraid, but he just couldn't stand by while this man hit me. So he stood between us. Whenever I cried, Alfalfa would walk up to me, look at me, come in real close and put his head on my shoulder. Only dog in the world who has ever done that for me. He would gulp as if he was crying with me.

When he was 18 months old, the dogs were in the yard, and I was sitting on the patio. Alfalfa got the gate open by jumping on the latch just right. It was a BIG yard, and by the time I got up to get them, Riley had taken off like a shot, and Alfalfa followed him. Long story short, I found Riley safe and sound several hours later, and then in the wee hours of the morning, I found Alfalfa on the side of the highway, near death. Me and my friend immediately loaded up Alfalfa into her SUV, and hauled off to the vet as fast as we could. The injuries were very massive, and I am amazed this dog survived. He fractured his jaw and skull in multiple places, one side of him was ripped wide open, and he was 100% black and blue, and I could not even find his teeth becase his mouth was so swollen.

I told the vet if he could not save this dog that I would go dig a hole and curl up in it and die. I told the vet, you can NOT let this dog die. Talk about putting some pressure on the vet! Alfalfa seizured for several hours as the vet attempted to work on him and sew up his side.

Alfalfa was hit by a car on a Saturday, very early AM. Except for a very brief visit on Sunday, the vet would not let me see Alfalfa until his office was open on Monday. I stayed wide awake and did not get one wink of sleep, until Monday morning, when I crawled into Alfalfa's cage at the vet, wrapped my body ever so carefully around his, and went to sleep. I slept all the way until the vet closed that evening. I did not know I was pregnant at the time. (!!!!!)

He had some surgery later on, to attach all the loose fragments of his skull and jaw.

When he was well enough, he came home. I took pictures, but kept chickening out on developing the film. Never did develop that film. Shortly after coming home, he had his first seizure, and continued to have them occasionally throughout his life. He made a remarkable recovery considering the extent of his injuries.

When Alfalfa was 3, my then boyfriend had an upcoming court hearing for several charges related to drinking. I wrote the judge a letter, and said, you give this man 6 months in jail, and I promise you, I will take the opportunity to get me and this child out of here. Guess what? The judge gave him EXZACTLY 6 months. And I gottheheackouttadodge! We moved over two thousand miles away. Alfalfa no longer had to stand between me and that jerk when he would threaten to hit me.

Life got much better after that. For awhile, we lived near a small lake. It was in walking distance. We would walk over there every day. One day, Alfalfa decided he didn't want to wait until we got to the shore part, and instead, he leapt off the cliff, and did a 20 foot dive into the water. I will never forget the sight as long as I live. I thought the impact of the water would render him unconscious. Especially with all the surgery that had been done on his skull. I immediately tied my toddler son to a tree with the dog leash by the back of his overalls, and prepared to jump in the water. Amazingly, Alfalfa seemed fine and was having a blast swimming around. I am telling you, the dog was INSANE. Now Alfalfa had to see if he could make it alllll the way over to shore. I was still on the ready, prepared to jump in the water at any given moment. I called Alfalfa over to the right direction towards shore. I hollered andhollered and encouraged and yelled and encouraged. He made it. My throat was hoarse for the rest of that day. Crazy, crazy dog.

He was with us for 12 wonderful years. In his last years, he developed diabetes, and became blind. He was a real trooper through all his twice day shots. He knew after he ate was time for his shot, and he would come lean his side on me and brace himself for his shot. Clearly he knew the shot was medicine that he needed. There were a few times his glucose got out of whack, and sometimes when I took him in, the vet was amazed Alfalfa was still conscious, never mind able to walk into the vet on his own. Diabetics glucose can go out of whack very quickly. We managed his diabetes for 4 years.

One day, he was unable to walk anymore. I took him to the vet, we did x-rays. We tried stronger arthritis meds. Nothing worked. I was sleeping downstairs with Alfalfa on his bed every night, and he would cry, every night.

One morning we knew it was time. We called the vet, and asked him to please come to our house to euthanize Alfalfa.

I believe he could have easily given up and died from the massive injuries he suffered when hit by a car 10 years eariler, but he willed himself to live, because he knew how much I needed him. And when his day came to die, I hurt so very badly. I walked out to the porch where he could not hear me, I burst out sobbing, and I talked to God, and I told Him, I did not have the strength to get through this without being a big mess. I asked God, please help me hold it together until Alfalfa is safe with you. I do not want him to feel he needs to stay alive for me. I then felt a calm come over me, and a warmth, like I was being hugged, and it was very comforting, and gave me a security. Words can't describe it.

I walked into the house, and I talked to Alfalfa, and I told him thank you, for what you did for me. I told Alfalfa, I'm OK now. I am safe now. I told him it was OK to go ahead and be with my Dad. (my father was my best friend and passed away when I was 9)

I managed to hold it together, and Alfalfa died almost as soon as the euthanasia was administered. Alfalfa died in my arms, very quickly, at home, on his bed, that we had slept together on for so many nights. I held it together for a few moments longer, Riley came over and licked Alfalfa on the face, and then I let loose.

I became very stressed after Alfalfa's passing. I couldn't eat, and when I did, I threw up. I couldn't sleep, and I had constant headaches. Riley, his lifetime companion of 12 years, went into a deep depression.

Me and my husband knew, Alfalfa would want the spot in our home to not be wasted, and go to another special needs dog. We adopted Henry Oct. 27th, exzactly one month after Alfalfa died. My health quickly improved. I will always miss Alfalfa terribly, but I am so blessed, for the time I had with him.

Unfortunately I did not have a digital camera when Alfalfa was young, so I only have pictures of Alfalfa in his older years on the computer. Some day I will have his pictures of when he was young scanned at the grocery store and I will add them to the pictures below.

Alfalfa always wanted to be near the children. When I felt the children were being too noisy, I would tell them to play somewhere else, and Alfalfa would just get up, walk over to where the kids were, and lay down in between them. He loved the children very much.

No matter how old Alfalfa was, he LOVED to go camping!

The day before he passed on.

Saying good bye.=(

Another Chiropractic Adjustment..

2008-09-17T17:10:00.002-04:00

Yesterday Henry had another Chiropractic adjustment yesterday. All went well, and no seizures afterwards! =)

WOW!!!

2008-09-03T09:07:00.003-04:00

No Grand-Mals last night!!!!!! Yay!!!! I did Ocular Compression, and I also gave Henry some ice cubes to munch on at bedtime to get his body temp. down in hopes it helps.

Ocular Compression

2008-09-02T22:08:00.002-04:00

I have been doing something called Occular Compression, in hopes of warding off any seizures that may happen in this 24 hours. Let's hope I'm doing it right and it does the trick.

You can read more about it here.

Prayers and Good Thoughts Appreciated

2008-09-02T13:13:00.002-04:00

Henry was chiropracticly adjusted again today, at 11 AM. He's resting comfortably. I am super cleaning the house, getting everything ready just in case he clusters again.

The chiro said Henry was not as out of alignment this time. That shows promise. Focal Flycatchers have 100% dissapeared by the way.

I really appreciate that noone has ever criticized our approach. (and just so everyone knows, I do not consider expressions of concern to be criticism)

Update...

2008-08-30T08:43:00.002-04:00

No more Grand-Mals, it has now been over 24 hours! Also, no Flycatcher Focal Seizures either! I know the Grand-Mals he had yesterday were very likely the result of the chiropractic adjustments, and please understand, (I know this can be hard to wrap one's brain around) that it actually is a GOOD sign. It means that the chiropractor targeted the CORRECT spots. The chiropractor explains it a world better than I can. Basically in the long run, after a few more adjustments, Henry should do much better.

And Another...

2008-08-29T09:39:00.011-04:00

When a pet has more than one Grand-Mal in a 24 hour period, it is referred to as Cluster Seizures. Cluster seizures are not to be taken lightly.

Henry had another Grand-Mal at 4:55am. It was different from most Grand-Mals. For one thing, the ice pack took a few seconds longer to take effect. Then he got up, and started lunging at the walls. I barricaded him in a 4 foot by 4 foot corner of the bedroom next to the bed. He then settled for trying to lunge in the corner next to the dresser. He then stood rigid with back arched and bit down on the dresser and his mouth chomping on it in a surreal manner. His face looked like a werewolf. With one hand I held the ice-pack on his back, and with my other arm I wrapped it around his chest trying to hold him back from chomping on the dresser and lunging. Seizuring dogs are STRONG! Fortunately once I put the ice-pack on (second time during this Grand-mal) it did not last much longer.

It's interesting that he was adjusted in two places, and had two Grand-mals. I believe this indicates the right spots were targeted for Henry's epilepsy. It's supposed to be worse before it gets better. I sure hope from here on out he improves.

Henry seems unsure of himself. He's been acting this way since the adjustment, like he knows something is different. He's not showing any pain at all from the adjustment and never did.

He's being very sweet, giving me lots of kisses.

I am keeping him very quiet today. I am glad to have a playroom for the kids.

Another...

2008-08-29T00:48:00.005-04:00

I wanted so much to get the stupid ice pack in effect on VIDEO. Yes, once again, Henry seized. (Grand-Mal) I have had the camera in a handy dandy spot for over two weeks now, on the ready to video the next one. I dont know how those people on You Tube must manage to get videos of their dogs Grand-Mals, I swear they must all know some kind of houdini magic.

Anyways, Henry shook all the way from his bed to the door frame 3 feet away, and was violently hitting the door frame, WHACK, WHACK, WHACK, crazy fast. I RUN for that ice bag, and then go to grab the camera which is SUPPOSED to be within my reach except my husband took it and was fumbling with it before I turned it on for him. Too late, video lost. I wasn't gonna have Henry continue whacking that door frame with such extreme violence like that. I had to forget about the video. So let me just narrate the events for you instead.

~Henry goes into crazy violent Grand-Mal, reverberating several feet away from his orignal spot.

~I run for ice-pack.

~I place it on Bull's Eye spot.

~Before I can count to two, he stops reverberating all over the place.

~He then tried to walk, but had great difficulty. (Reaching for #$%^%$# not where it was supposed to be camera made me lose precious seconds so post-ictal was a little worse than usual)

~He makes it to the kitchen. Laying on his tummy, he starts peeing and pouping and his legs are paddling like crazy in splayed out fashion. It's not the same crazy Grand-Mal reverberating all over the place like before, but it's still definately a Grand-Mal.

~Grab the ice bag again, place it on Bull's Eye spot.

~Presto, stops before I can count to two.

~Henry then gets up, with difficulty, I manage to get Henry outside. (This time he had some actual post-ictal). He ran into the garage. I gently went to get him by the collar, and he jumped out of his skin and snapped at me in confusion. He ran medium speed outside for about ten-fifteen minutes. (Without ice-pack, he runs full speed for over an hour smacking into things full force)

Let me re-enforce to you all, every single second in getting that ice pack absolutely counts!

Sorry I sound so grumpy. Even a little bit of Post-Ictal is a BEAR and those of you who have experienced it know what I mean! And this is 80# of Post-Ictal!

OK, now, onto something I should have posted about earlier....

Chiropractic!

Henry had his first chiropractic adustment this afternoon. He had two adjustments done for today. He goes back in one week for more. I was warned before hand, that often epileptic dogs will have a Grand-Mal within 24 hours after their first chiropractic adjustment. And then there is improvement after that, sometimes no more seizures ever. (with cont'd diligent care such as diet and etc.)

I will re-set the count up clock tomorrow morning. I need to go apologize to my husband for snapping at him, and go to bed.

New Epilepsy Awareness Blog!

2008-08-13T18:29:00.001-04:00

Check it out! <--- click on there

Starting A New Blog Soon...

2008-08-12T09:17:00.002-04:00

I am going to be starting a new blog soon. This blog (The BARF Blog) chronicles our journey as we tried several diets and learned by experience what triggers seizures and what stops/prevents them and etc. I learned the hard way what works and what does not. It would have spared Henry of so much if I would have known all that I do now back when I first adopted him. Though I can't rewind time, I can share this info with others in hopes it helps them.

I would like to do a 'condensed' blog now that I know alot more than I did when I started The BARF Blog. A blog explaining about Flagyl and why vets don't warn us about increased risk of seizures, how the research was done, etc. Also about why raw can be a bad idea for a dog with epilepsy, meats and veggies that have a 'cooling' effect, taurine, vitamin B, and etc., etc.

I haven't figured out a name for the new blog yet. This blog will not just be about Henry, but also about Lucky, a greyhound whose diet we are mimicing. Both Henry and Lucky are having wonderful improvement with the diet.

I will be posting Lucky's recipe in the sidebar, and then I will post Henry's almost identical recipe as well.

I would love to see the circle of dogs who benefit from all this grow larger and larger. This helps get the word out more and more.

Figuring Henry Out More & More

2008-08-11T16:31:00.006-04:00

When I started the home-cooked diet, I still had a few un-resolved questions about Henry and what his triggers are. First of all, I wasn't sure about the dairy in the diet. For *some* epi-dogs, it can be a trigger. Clearly for Henry, it is not! =)

I also was not sure if Henry had a sensitivity to chicken, or if he had a sensitivity to antibiotics in meat. (antibiotics are a definate trigger for Henry)

For the first 22 days, Henry ate organic beef. I then switched to organic chcken, and I fed him a raw chicken neck Friday evening. The raw chicken neck was a BIG no-no. He had a grand-mal the next day. I then proceeded to continue to feed him the cooked chicken I started that same evening I gave him the raw neck, and made note not to *ever* feed him raw anything ever again.

Henry then had flycatchers last night. It helps me that Henry no longer has daily flycatchers in that when he *does* have flycatchers, I look at what he has had in the last 24 hours and do some detective work with his diet. Today Henry is going back on the beef. No more chicken for Henry.

Lucky however, the greyhound's diet we are impersonating, does not do well on beef. He gets chicken instead. There's some trial and error involved in figuring out your individual epi-dog, and then you tweak the recipe accordingly.

Lucky & Henry's recipes are identical, except in that we use different meat.

Well, He Made It 23 Days This Time

2008-08-09T18:10:00.004-04:00

Henry had a grand-mal this afternoon. Started out extremely violent. I grabbed the ice pack, wanted to grab the camera, but Henry was really flying and about to fall off the couch. So I couldn't get it on video.

This time he hurt himself in his mouth, and there was quite a bit of blood. I can't find exactly where in his mouth he hurt himself. I think he bit the bottom of his tongue. The bleeding has ended.

Anyways, remember how many of you helped me figure out the ice pack needs to be placed higher on Henry's spine? Well I did that this time, and even with the grand-mal of this magnitude, I still had better results. He didn't even need to make a bowel movement at all during the grand-mal. He made his bowel movement outside *after* the seizure was fully over.

I think the trigger was a raw chicken neck I gave him yesterday. I was hoping since it was organic it would be OK. No more chicken necks for Henry.

I anxiously await to see if Henry can make it longer next time. I really hate re-starting the countup clock all over. =(

Common Ice Pack Mistakes

2008-08-05T08:54:00.005-04:00

I would like to address some common mistakes that limit the effectiveness of the ice pack trick.

~Use crushed ice, not cubed ice. You need it to form to the back.

~Periodically check the bag of ice to make sure it is not stuck in a clump. Break up as needed.

~Do NOT use frozen veggies. Seriously! If you want *BEST* results, use what is *coldest*, which is ICE. Nothing will be colder than a bag of crushed ice. Do not use special cooler packs made to keep your cooler cold either. For BEST results, use crushed ice. You have found veggies to be effective? Great! Ice will work even BETTER!

~Apply it as QUICKLY as possible.

~If you have a long haired breed, you will need to part the hair well so there isn't a bunch of fur between the ice pack and the back.

~For easy reference of where the ice pack goes, I am re-posting the diagram.

Sixteen Days!

2008-08-02T11:43:00.002-04:00

I'm so stinking excited!!!! If Henry can make it to 21 days, he will have beat his record since this whole mess started! It means there is definately a light at the end of the tunnel! Henry continues to do very well. He is not even having flycatchers. He's not twitchy anymore, he seems more even and coherent.

Even if he should have a grand-mal right now, I know this diet is better for him than any other diet he has been on!

You know what else I love? Our house smells so much better! ;) No more farting! =D

Two Weeks!

2008-07-31T08:46:00.003-04:00

Since March 11th, Henry has made it past two weeks without a grand-mal only twice.

Today, Henry has made it two weeks!!! Since starting the home cooked, he does not even have the flycatcher seizures anymore.

If he can make it to a full month now, that would be really great!

Lucky, the greyhound with epilepsy whose diet we are copying, has been able to have his phenobarbital dropped and has still remained seizure free, over 4 months now!

Update

2008-07-28T16:29:00.002-04:00

Henry has made it beyond 24 hrs without vomiting at all. Whew! Flycatchers are still gone. Today is 11 days of no grand-mals. Last flycatchers were while I was cooking the first full home cooked meal for Henry on Thursday, 4 days ago. I'm excited that we could really be making some progress here! =)

2008-07-27T20:34:00.003-04:00

I contacted my friend who gave us the recipe we are using for Henry, and I told him everything about Henry's vomiting. He asked what Henry was vomiting,(ie., food or bile or etc.) and I explained there were big chunks of meat in the vomit. He suggested I chop the meat up finely. So I pulsed it in the food processor.
I think this will make a big difference. I will keep you all posted!

Detoxing?

2008-07-27T17:04:00.001-04:00

I think Henry is going through Detox. He threw up three times today. No diarrhea though. (yet anyways!)

Fly Catcher Seizures Have Stopped

2008-07-26T10:29:00.003-04:00

Every day these last couple weeks, Henry has been having at least a few fly catcher seizures every day. We haven't seen any since the diet switch! =)

Switch has gone well, no diarrhea, poups are smaller and nice and firm, and yesterday he only made one bowel movement instead of the usual two.

Today we are going to go out and buy more beef, as the beef is nearly all gone.

About The Antibiotic Free Meat...

2008-07-24T21:24:00.004-04:00

I am fortunate to have found a place that sells only meat that has been raised with NO antibiotics, steroids or hormones. Their meat is significantly cheaper than the organic meat in the grocery store. For example, the stew meat I got for $3.98/lb. The grocery store charges $12.99/lb for organic stew meat. Whole chicken is $1.98 at the meat market, the grocery store sells organic chicken for $7.99/lb. It really pays to look for the best price!

We are using stew meat at first, and if Henry does well with this, then we will give chicken a try. Riley will be kept on kibble with a small dollop of homecooked to keep costs down.

The reason we are using antibiotic free meat, is because until Henry was given Flagyl, he had good seizure control. I sincerely blame the Flagyl for the dramatic increase in frequency of seizures. I shudder that I did not know better and put him through a full round of Flagyl and then even started a second! So what I am trying to do is basically prevent and any and all, even trace amounts, of exposure to antibiotics, until the seizures get back under control. Then we will see if he still needs antibiotic free meat. If he does, so be it.

My First Homecooked Meal!

2008-07-24T18:19:00.009-04:00

Hey everybuddy! Dis is Henry, and I's got some really exciting news!!!

My Mommy went shoppin', and she bought all dis YUMMY stuff fer ME! It's ALL organic and totally antibiotic free. Boy, my Mommy must REALLY love me! =D (The rice by the way, is gluten free)

She already has Veggie Goop part all made. So first step is to cook the yummy lean stew beef and beef bones in stock pot with just enough water to cover.
The next step after the beef is cooked, is to remove the beef, and then cook the gluten free organic rice in this yummy vitamin rich broth. Then, we will throw away the bones. We will be posting more pictures as we progress...

OK Mommy, is dinner ready yet?

Riley singing for his dinner...

Here's their dinner: (Henry's is on your left, Riley's on the right)
Henry's meal is 1/2 kibble, 1/2 homecooked. (full amount of veggie goop cause he's already used to that) If within 24 hours there is no diarrhea, then we will make the full switch. You can enlarge each picture by clicking onto them.

They really enjoyed it! =D

Starting Full Home Cooked!!!!!

2008-07-22T12:49:00.009-04:00

Okey doke! We have tried everything under the sun except full home cooked diet. (and putting back on pheno which we *really* would like to avoid) Henry has been having some flycatcher seizures. Nothing serious, but it does indicate to me something is triggering this, and knowing his pattern, it tends to lead to a full blown grand-mal within a few days. I know for sure Flagyl antibiotics are one definite trigger of flycatchers. When Henry was on Flagyl (an antibiotic), he had flycatchers almost constantly.

On Friday, we are starting a full home cooked diet. Henry has shown sensitivity to poultry. Me and my husband were just discussing the possibility that antibiotics in meat may be what's really causing the problem. With commercial food, it's very hard to have control over what meat is in there. So, we will be doing homemade with antibiotic free meat, giving chicken a try first. I joined a food co-op list, hoping to find something in my area, hopefully accessing antibiotic free meat for a cheaper price than the grocery store.

Fall is not too far away, then we will have venison. We are going to get a deep chest freezer and fill it with as much venison as possible. My husband has a friend who will hunt us deer for a small fee.

This is the recipe we will be using:

1 to 1 1/2 cups brown rice
1 1/2 cups of boiled chicken or stew meat or venison.
1/2 cup of Veggie Goop
1/4 cup of cottage cheese in morning and 1/4 cup yogurt at evening meal.
1 teaspoon of CALL OF THE WILD.

I will post pictures and keep you all up to date of course! Riley will still be getting kibble, to help keep costs down. We'll put a small dollop of home cooked on top of his kibble so he doesn't feel too left out.

How The Ice Pack Eases Post-Ictal (dramatically!)

2008-07-21T11:56:00.007-04:00

Those of you who are all too familiar with grand-mals, know that the post-ictal can be just as much, if not more of a nightmare than the grand-mal itself.

Henry's first grand-mal here, we did not know about the ice pack trick yet. I was stunned by how horrible the post-ictal was. Henry was running full force in the house. It was all I could do to direct him to the backyard. There he cont'd to run. Mind you, he's about 90% greyhound, and runs like one! For over an hour, Henry ran full force in the backyard.

He was not blind, but his brain did not compute how close things were in front of him, so he would smack into the garage full force, then turn around and run smack in to the fence full force, and so on and on. I stood there at 3 am, in the snow, in nothing but a long parka, undies and shoes, crying as I watched him go through this. It was awful. Words cant explain how awful.

When I brought him in the house, he was still pretty crazy, jumping up onto the counters and such, very non-typical of Henry. He also kept getting caught in multiple dead ends around the house, and cont'd to act blind till the next day. It was horrible!

Anyways, I posted at greytalk, and told them all about it. One lady explained to me, that the body overheats while seizing. The post-ictal pacing/running is their way of cooling down, and is necessary. I guess it's like, if you or I do a real tough workout, we cant just stop abruptly in the middle. We need to do cool down exercises. You have to understand, the body *dramatically* overheats during a seizure, more than any workout could overheat us. So while it may seem hard to believe that frantic running is 'cooling down', it really is, compared to the grand-mal.

This is my non-educated theory on why the ice pack so drastically reduces the post-ictal~ When I use the ice-pack on Henry, the violent crazy shaking all over part of the seizure abruptly stops. Without the ice pack, he'd go on and do that for several minutes. With the ice pack, he only does that as long as it takes me to get the ice-pack. Which is usually a matter of seconds. The faster I get the ice-pack, the easier the post-ictal is. I believe this is because the ice pack stops the overheating part, by abruptly stopping the violent shaking part, thus, there is less of a need for them to cool down.

Another Grand-Mal & Making A Diet Change

2008-07-17T10:09:00.014-04:00

I haven't told you all this, but Henry is still prone to some diarrhea, even since I took him off raw. It's not as often now, but he does still get it from time to time. With Henry still seizing more often than is considered safe, we have decided to try a diet change. Right now we have Henry on Dick Van Patten's Sweet Potato & Venison. We chose this food for a variety of reasons:

~poultry free (poultry seems to trigger frequent focal seizures)

~grain free

~not quite as rich as most grain frees, which may be easier on Henry's tummy

In addition to the kibble, I am adding 1/2 a cup of Veggie Goop. To each meal. This new diet transition started just last night, and last night was the dogs first night of getting the Veggie Goop.

Henry had a grand-mal early this morning. I think it was the diet change. When I took him off raw, he had one within 24 hours at that time too. I really wanted to get it on camcorder, to show how the ice pack worked, but the seizure started out so extremely fast and severe, I just had to stop it right away. Time was of the essence.

I will tell you though, that the new slightly higher up place for the ice pack was extremely effective, The grand-mal, though it was totally full blown, stopped instantly. It is amazing how he went from earth shattering very, very bad seizing, to no seizing. He twitched maybe twice after. He still did need to make his usual bowel movement though, before he could get up, and did a little pacing for about 5 minutes after his bowel movement. Not bad at all! Now, without that ice-pack, considering how that grand-mal started out, it would have been VERY bad. And that seizure would have been quite damaging. I believe he'd be running around frantically, and he'd be temprarily blind, and we would have ended up taking him to the vet either in the middle of the night or as soon as the regular vet opened.

Anyways, we will give the new diet mentioned in the first paragraph of this post a try, and if Henry does not show improvement within a month, we will be trying a full home cooked diet. And if that doesn't work, then I guess we'll have to add phenobarbital. =(

This is the recipe a friend of mine uses for his epi-hound.

1 to 1 1/2 cups brown rice
1 1/2 cups of boiled chicken ( Half a chicken breast in morning and half in evening).
1/2 cup of Veggie Goop
1/4 cup of cottage cheese in morning and 1/4 cup yogurt at evening meal.
1 teaspoon of CALL OF THE WILD.

I'd need to change the meat as it has poultry. I don't know if hamburger would be too rich for Henry though? We live in Michigan, and in the fall, we will be in an abundance of venison here.

If anybody has any feedback to share on the above recipe for Henry's sensitive tummy, and/or suggestions for tweaking, it would be much appreciated! I have it set so that ANYONE can leave a comment. You do not have to be a blogger.

Birthday Cake Fit For A Hound

2008-07-11T09:53:00.005-04:00

Yesterday was Bill's 9th Birthday! Here's a picture of the sweet Birthday boy!
(Bill belongs to a lady who posts at a board I frequent)

Happy Birthday Bill! =D

Here's the Birthday cake his Mommy made for him:

Yup, them thar's CHICKEN FEET on top of the cake, rofl! The cake itself is liver cake brownie, the frosting is a mix of chunky peanut butter and yogurt. (note the the naked corner of the cake, one of the hounds decided to give it a 'taste test'. ;) ) The top is decorated with chicken feet and multi-colored mooshies. =)

The Official Correct Place For The Ice Pack!!!!

2008-07-09T22:00:00.007-04:00

OK, so I have been in contact with a couple doctors, and we got this figured out! A lady who has a PhD in Biomedical Science brought it to my attention that the previous diagram was incorrect,(that blog entry had been deleted) and explained where the ice pack needed to go. I then got in touch with a chiropractor and she explained further where is the right place for the ice pack, and I showed her the diagram and she said, "BINGO!" =D

THIS is the correct and most effective place to put the ice pack.

Thank you SO much to everyone who contributed to helping me figure out the right place! Henry says thank you too! =)

For more info on ice pack, click here.

What The Ice Pack Does

2008-07-08T09:05:00.008-04:00

This morning, at 6:30am, Henry went into a full blown grand-mal, of mass proportions. Jaw locked open, rattling all over, etc., etc. I ran and got the ice pack, and instantly he changed from the full blown seizure to this stage: (a little graphic, somewhat disturbing, but not too bad)

I have tried to describe before how the ice bag brings him out of the really bad stage, but he isn't actually over it yet. This video shows what I mean. The video may disturb you a little. It does not show the severe part of the sezure, but it does show Henry still in a rather unpleasant state. He stays in that state until he makes his bowel movement, then he gets up and is much better, though may be still a little disoriented. Before we knew of the ice bag trick, Henry was out of it for hours, running at full speed in a panic and bumping full force into things. It's a BIG improvement with the ice pack trick.

EDITING TO ADD: I shared this with the epil k-9 list, and many of them mentioned that the ice pack needs to a be a little higher. I will be trying that next time, and hopefully I will get even better results! Thanks everyone! =)

Veggiegoop

2008-07-06T23:24:00.010-04:00

A person who is fostering a greyhound with epilepsy makes his foster grey something called 'Veggiegoop'. He prepares it in a juicer and adds the liquid and pulp back after the juicing process. Here is the veggiegoop recipe:

2 golden apples cored.
2 red apples cored.
2 pints strawberries
2 pints blueberries
2 bunches of carrots
2 heads red headed lettuce
2 heads romaine lettuce
1 head kale
1/2 buch of collard greens
1 bunch parsley
2 inches of ginger root
2 green zuchini
1 red pepper
1 green pepper
2 yams
1 brocolli head, but not stem so as to avoid gas

I don't have a juicer, but I do have a food processor. The idea behind the veggie goop is the vitamin B, which many epi-pups do benefit from. When I gave Henry raw fish, the thimainase in it caused his vitamin B to plummet, and resulted in a very bad grand-mal that I thought was going to kill him. I'm gonna give this veggie goop a try. I will be adding it to Henry's kibble, Wellness Core Ocean which is a grain free high protein diet. The person who shared this recipe adds it to a home cooked diet.

The vegetables are NOT cooked, they are processed raw, which leaves the vitamins more intact. I've heard veggies should always be cooked for better digestibility, but if were killing the vitamins through cooking, then that's not much good is it?

Survey Of How Epi-Pups Did On BARF or Raw

2008-07-06T08:35:00.001-04:00

http://www.canine-epilepsy.com/survey.html

sigh Reset the ticker

2008-06-25T06:54:00.005-04:00

Good news and bad news, Henry had a grand mal this morning. It was mild though. Not super mild, but mild. The good news is, it had been a very long time since he had made it 20 days. I thnk he just has to slowly recover from the pattern that was created in his brain from previous seizures, and as long as his seizures get further apart and stay mild, I'm not increasing or adding more seizure meds.

I added to the seizure record, (in sidebar) how many days he made it grand-mal free each time. Makes it easier to reference and see what Henry's pattern is.

Cocoa Mulch Is Toxic To Dogs

2008-06-09T15:11:00.004-04:00

_http://www.snopes.com/critters/crusader/cocoa.htm_
(http://www.snopes.com/critters/crusader/cocoa.htm) This site gives the
following information:

Cocoa Mulch, which is sold by Home Depot, Foreman's Garden Supply and other Garden supply stores, contains a lethal ingredient called 'Theobromine'.

It is lethal to dogs and cats. It smells like chocolate and it really attracts dogs. They will ingest this stuff and die. Several deaths already occurred in the last 2-3 weeks. Just a word of caution: check what you are using in your gardens and be aware of what your gardeners are using in your gardens.

Theobromine is the ingredient that is used to make all chocolate especially dark or baker's chocolate which is toxic to dogs.

Cocoa bean shells contain potentially toxic quantities of theobromine, a xanthine compound similar in effects to caffeine and theophylline. A dog that ingested a lethal quantity of garden mulch made from cacao bean shells developed severe convulsions and died 17 hours later. Analysis of the stomach contents and the ingested cacao bean shells revealed the presence of lethal amounts of theobromine.

Please spread the word!

Bailey

2008-06-06T12:13:00.002-04:00

Tonight Bailey will be euthanized in her home, surrounded by her family. I very much think they are making the right choice, though it is a very painful one to make. Please pray for this family. Today and the next few days will be very difficult.

Going camping!

2008-06-01T11:03:00.004-04:00

Hey everyone! Both boys are doing well on their new diet. Currently it is Wellness Core Ocean for Henry, Innova Senior for Riley, Merrick's canned (either Cowboy Cookout or Venison Holiday), a probiotic a day for Henry, and beef heart twice a week. We are keeping Henry's diet grain and poultry free, hoping this helps? All is going well so far, except Henry did have one more grand mal since I last posted, (see sidebar seizure record) but it was so mild I was almost tempted to call it a petit-mal, except when they lose control of bowels it is always considered a grand mal which Henry did.

Today we are going camping, but we are staying within 20 minutes of home, just in case it is all too stressful for Henry and we need to come home. We are going to great lengths to set it up in as comfortable of a way as possible for the dogs. We will post pictures! =) We will be home on June 5th.

WANTED! Blog Links About Epilepsy &/Or Greyhounds

2008-05-15T09:12:00.009-04:00

If you have a pet with epilepsy, and you blog about your experience, please leave me a comment. I would like to set up several links in my sidebar to other blogs about pets with epilepsy. Many people come to my blog looking for info on epilepsy, and I think they'd like if they could read about several pet's experiences with epilepsy rather than just Henry's.

Epilepsy is more common than we realize among pets, and after I witnessed my first grand-mal, there was an incredibly lonely feeling. And hearing from others who has been through this really helped me alot. It helps to hear about a variety of experiences.

One lady, she adopted a greyhound that was having terrible, terrible, earth shattering humongous seizures almost every night between 10-11pm. She was told she would likely need to euthanize her greyhound. She persevered and kept adjusting the meds, and today, her hound has been seizure free THREE years!!! WOW huh? =D You really should go read her story. She has been a great comfort to me as I struggle to get it right with Henry. She knows what it is like to watch your hound have such horrid severe seizures, and she also knows there is always hope. Her hound, Saint, makes this world a better place for other dogs with seizures in that he went from being such a hopeless case to being seizure free 3 years.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Also, there are so many misconceptions about greyhounds. It is amazing how little people know about greyhounds. If you have greyhound(s) and you blog, I would love to put your link in my sidebar, so people can get a better feel for what a great breed greyhounds are. Greyhounds are not the hyper breed many think they are. In fact, they are a fantastic breed for older people, or people with disabilities. They are one of the more gentle breeds. Our Henry is extremely gentle. He is perfect for my husband being in a wheelchair, because he is the right height, and he is super gentle.

Many people are under the impression that racing greyhounds run all day long. When in fact, they only race on average once every four days. Greyhounds are fast yes, but they are not built for endurance. They are lazy, and their favorite activity is sleeping. =P

Out of our two dogs, an American Eskimo and a Greyhound/Coonhound mix, the American Eskimo has the higher prey drive, and is the hyper one, and is the one who tugs on the leash and has a tendency to be naughty. (goes nuts when he sees kitties, squirrels, etc.) People would think it to be the other way around, but it is not. In fact, when I walk my dogs, people see Henry's size and breed, and that I am so small and they ask who is walking who, motioning towards Henry, not seeming to notice that he is directly at my side, and the leash is loose. I always point out that it is actually our American Eskimo, who is almost half of Henry's size, walking us all. Henry is a fantastic ambassador for greyhounds.

People adopt little dogs like Yorkies and such thinking they don't want a hyper dog. The truth is, little dogs are often plenty hyper, and what they lack in size they more than make up for in a-t-t-i-t-u-d-e, LOL! I have nothing against small dogs, but people tend to adopt them for the wrong reason.

This Lady Needs Help ASAP

2008-05-14T18:56:00.002-04:00

Her dog is suffering from severe continuous neck cramps. Vets are baffled and don't know what to do. Could you please go over to her blog and see the video and if you have any ideas leave her a comment? This is urgent.

http://baileyannemarie.blogspot.com/

Made It 19 days This Time

2008-05-14T07:05:00.007-04:00

Henry was previosuly having seizures every 9-10 days. This morning at 5:24 am, Henry had a grand mal. I ran to get the ice pack, and as I re-entered the bedroom, my husband said in amazement that it was over already and hardly that bad. Never did need the ice pack.

Something I have noticed about Henry's grand mals, is he can never get up until *after* he makes a bowel movement. I never even try to encourage him to get up, as that would only agitate him being in that post seizure stage. I let Henry decide when he wants to get up. I know some might be tempted to hurry and get their dog outside before he/she makes a bowel movement, and maybe for some dogs that might be OK, but for Henry, I just accept that his pattern shows he is simply out of it until he makes that bowel movemment and rushing round and trying to get him outside before the bowel movement would be a very bad thing to do to Henry. Calmness is so important during a seizure.

After he has made his bowel movement, then he gets up, and he attempts to walk, usually failing in the first few minutes. Then he walks into walls and stuff, which he did today also. He always get caught up in dead ends around the house post seizure. I have heard of many dogs post seizure doing this.

Anyways, he is resting on the sofa comfortably. I am glad he made it twice as long as normal this time. Let's hope next time is even longer.

Tagged-6 Word Memoir

2008-05-09T12:43:00.015-04:00

We have been tagged by Stanislaw. =)

This is how to play:

1. Post a 6-word memoir on your blog and include visuals if you'd like.
2. Link to the blog and dog who tagged you, ideally to their original memoir post.
3. Tag at least 5 more pups with blogs, link to them, and leave them a comment with an invitation to play.
4. Have fun!

Patient

Leash manners extraordinaire, Mama's boy. =D

Leash puller extradonaire.

Tolerant
(one of Mommy's knitting projects in progress)

Zoomies

Couch potato

I am not really sure who to tag, but if you would like to participate, please leave a comment linking to your blog. I look forward to reading your memoirs! =)

TWO WEEKS!!! =D

2008-05-09T08:30:00.004-04:00

Finally! Henry made it two weeks without a grand-mal! Look to your left, at the top of the side bar, and you will see Henry's seizure history these last few months. Two weeks is a great accomplishment! =D

Let's hope we can go a full month now! The general rule of thumb is more than one grand mal per month is considered poor seizure control and in need of more meds.

I am keeping my hopes up!

Bug Repellant

2008-05-07T07:41:00.001-04:00

Over at the 'I Eat Raw Meat' blog, is a good article on controlling fleas, ticks and heartworms. Go check it out.

Heartworm Preventative

2008-05-02T20:06:00.007-04:00

We gave the boys their heartworm preventative today. I had been hoping to wait until Henry had gone a while without a grand-mal, but it is May already and we finally decided, even if the heartworm preventative does trigger a grand mal, we'd rather Henry have a grand-mal than have heartworms. If Henry can't handle the preventative, then he certainly can't handle actually having heartworms and the very dangerous treatment required to get rid of them!

Riley got Revolution, which takes care of fleas and ticks and everything.

Henry got Interceptor, which alot of people who have greyhounds with epilepsy like to use. It does not do anything for fleas and ticks though. We'll cross that bridge if that problem ever arises. I am hoping due to his very thin fur, fleas will not be interested in Henry.

Some heartworm preventatives are poisonous to greyhounds. Greyhounds have been known to die after 3 days of wearing a flea collar. You have to be very careful about this and find out which heartworm/flea/tick products are poisonous to greyhounds if you have a greyhound. It is because of their extreme low fat and they do not metabolize the same way other dogs do. It is a good idea to have a grey savvy vet if you have a greyhound in your family.

Another update...

2008-05-01T14:49:00.005-04:00

Tonight will be 1 week of no grand mals! =) Henry's fly catchers have reduced greatly. I keep trying to catch a video of flycatcher seizures so I can educate people on what they look like in case their own pets have them. But Henry's flycatchers have not been frequent enough to catch on video, a good thing actually! =D Back when the flycatchers were very frequent, I hadn't thought to get it on video back then. Basically what he does is he cranes his head upwards and snaps his mouth repeatedly, then licks his mouth rythmically for a little bit afterwards. I imagine it doesn't look the same in all dogs. Flycatchers are a much milder form of seizures than grand mals, but it's still good to know what they look like and be aware.

The new kibble is agreeing with Henry, (Wellness Core Ocean) but Riley is having semi soft light colored stools. So we will be trying a different kibble for Riley. (Eagle Pack holistic) I am still giving Henry probiotics. I'd like to get his immune system nice and well built up, and see if I can supplement with raw beef heart and turkey necks once in a while. Turkey necks clean teeth and beef heart has taurine. (good for canine epilepsy as long as your dog does not get diarrhea from the beef heart) If Henry can go three weeks of no seizures, I'll give it a try. It would not be in replacement of their regular kibble meals, it would be as a supplement.

Update

2008-04-26T09:12:00.004-04:00

Henry has made it beyond 24 hours without any grand mals! =) His stools are dark and firm, perfect! Riley however, the one who is usually NEVER sick, has light colored softish stool and made one huge throw up this morning. =( I am thinking Riley just needs to get beyond the transition period. He is 13 yrs old so that probably has something to do with it.

This is the kibble we are feeding:

http://www.wellnesspetfood.com/dog_wellness_grain_ocean.html

For canned we are feeding EVO 95% beef, but I have decided when we run out of the canned stuff, we will try cooked stew meat instead of the canned. Henry must have some food with moisture to go with his seizure med or he gets sick. I don't like that the label on the 95% canned beef was so complicated with words I can't pronounce.

Another seizure

2008-04-25T09:44:00.002-04:00

Henry seized again last night. Just a few minutes past midnight. This time the disorientaion was really bad afterwards, he couldnt get his back legs up to walk. I am not sure how long he seized before we woke up. It was heartbreakng to see him with back legs splayed out on the floor, panting and heaving very hard, with feces and urine all over him. He was a very unhappy dog. We got him a grain-free fish based kibble. I wonder if he is allergic to fish? Or was it just the diet change that triggered it? I wish I knew exactly what to do.

=(

By The Way...

2008-04-24T17:59:00.002-04:00

I just want everyone to know, that though raw did not work out, I still intend to keep this blog going. =) I will post more on different kibbles and other health/pet care matters, and what our pets are up to. And of course, I will post lots on anything I think could be helpful to others who have cats/dogs with epilepsy.

Picture Of Ice Pack

2008-04-24T17:23:00.008-04:00

Today we made up a new bag of ice. Thought I'd share a picture of how we do Henry's. It is filled with crushed ice. Henry is a bigger fellow, (80 lbs) so he needs a nice big bag. (2.5 gallon bags) Make sure the ice is not stuck in a clump when you use it!!! Very important! Also, it must be actual ice! Not frozen veggies or anything like that.

After a seizure, it is a good idea to give your dog something that is both sweet and has some fat. If you feed raw, you could feed a pice of raw meat with some honey on it. Today we picked up some Haagen Dazs vanilla ice cream for this purpose. It's such a tiny cute little container. =) We would give about half of it after a seizure, and then a regular meal.

As I was taking a picture of Henry's ice cream, he was looking at me like this. He looks as if he is saying, "Awww Mom, can't I have the ice-cream now, pretty please?"

Go to the link at the top of this blog entry, and it will tell you more about both the ice cream and the ice bag trick.

=(

2008-04-24T08:26:00.003-04:00

I am beginning to think raw is not for Henry. I wanted very much for this to work. Before raw, Henry's seizures were on average every three months. Now they are weekly. It has been two months with no improvement. I'm really sad. Because I was hoping I had found the 'magic ticket', and would be able to someday say, "Thanks to raw, Henry has gone longer than ever without a seizure." I am beginning to realize I just may never get to say that. I have heard raw do tremendous things for other dgs, *especially* dogs with epilepsy, so PLEASE, don't decide not to give it a try based on our failed experience. I do want to say, start your dog on probiotics BEFORE starting raw. Many dogs with epilepsy have problems with antibiotics, and my Henry is one of those.

I have been researching and researching and researching kibble. I found this: http://www.evopet.com/products/default.asp?id=1490 I like how it uses the bone and everything. The garlic worries me. It has rosemary, but fortunately only the essential oil part of it which is the harmless part. I would still like to give beef heart twice a week as a supplement, and hope that goes well, along with turkey neck for cleaning teeth. I'll have to go back to brushing their teeth regularly. I am trying very hard to be upbeat about this, but really just want to have a good long hard cry.

Another One =(

2008-04-23T19:20:00.005-04:00

Henry had another seizure a little over an hour ago. Started out really severe, with the jaw locked open, the body arched and then legs thrashing, I ran into the kitchen, my little one was standing in front of the fridge with his Dad. I picked my son up by the shoulders and calmly and quickly moved him two feet away, opened the freezer, grabbed the bag of ice, put it on Henry's back. Again the ice was stuck in a clump. I didnt waste time this time breaking it up. I layed the bag of ice on the floor and smashed it with my knee and then applied to the lowest part of Henry's back and then his jaw relaxed, his legs stopped thrashing, and his body was no longer like an out of balance washing machine. He laid there for a few minutes, doing little flinches and staring off in space. There was feces and urine everywhere. The ice bag trick, it really works. This seizure (the grand mal part) was less than a minute.

It isn't as cool outside anymore. After a seizure, it is important to always (gently) cool your dog down. I put Henry in the tub and put some cool water in the bottom. The cool water on his feet helped cool his whole body down. I then gave him a luke warm shower. He needed the shower anyways, as he had feces and urine on him.

Potassium Bromide & Tummy Upsets

2008-04-22T11:39:00.008-04:00

I noticed alot of people are googling Potassium Bromide along with other terms related to stomach upsets. I want to share my experience of giving Henry Potassium Bromide, both on kibble and on raw.

When on kibble, I would make a 'soup' with the Potassium Bromide. If I ever skipped the soup step, Henry would vomit and have loose stools. I made the soup by first putting in about 1/3 cup of canned food (Henry is 80 lbs) then I would inject the Potassium Bromide directly in the canned food, then add the kibble, and then add just enough hot (not scalding hot) water to cover the food. If I left either the water or canned food out, Henry would get sick.

Many worry their dog is not getting the full amount of Potassium Bromide and so they give it straight up, or simply inject it into a small piece of bread. I want to assure you that I have always put Henry's Potassium Bromide right into his food, and he has been able to maintain a good therapuetic level of Potassium Bromide in his blood, usually around 2.4.

With raw, I have not had to make the 'soup'. Raw meat already is very moist, so I just make a little opening with the tip of my poultry scissors and inject the Potassium Bromide straight into a piece of meat.

Henry however is not able to handle great amount of fats. I suspect it may be due to the Potassium bromide, so I do remove as much skin and fat as I can. Chicken is the base of Henry's diet cause it's more possible to remove the fat from that. With beef heart and steak (all beef basically) I find he can only handle organic, and I remove and big obvious clumps of white fat.

If your dog is on Potassium Bromide, and has achieved a desirable therapuetic level in his blood, and you are considering a diet change, you need to discuss with your vet how the new diet will affect the effectiveness of Potassium Bromide. Chloride levels vary in different kibbles and in raw. Just a little change in the amount of chloride your dog consumes can have a great affect on your dogs Potassium Bromide. You need to be careful or your dog may suffer from either Bromism (basically overdose) or may not get enough Potassium Bromide to give the seizure contol you had previously.

There is also another medicine very similar to Potassium Bromide, that if your dog continues to have upset tummy with Potassium Bromide no matter what you do, is a good alternative. I forget exactly what it is called, but your vet will know. I think it is something along the lines of Naproxen Sodium Bromide?

Processing Beef Heart

2008-04-18T21:17:00.007-04:00

Today I bought beef heart and processed it. I bought it already frozen.

This is how I processed it:

~I let it thaw slightly. Blood doesn't run out as much if chopped while still mostly frozen. The blood from cow heart is especially good for them, so try not to waste the blood. I thaw and chop in a glass casserole dish, to contain the blood.

~I cut it in half fist size chunks with an electric knife.

~I laid the chunks out in casserole dishes, and put it in the freezer till completely frozen again. I think this is only safe to do if you did not let it thaw out very much to begin with. Make sure the chunks don't touch each other, or they'll freeze stuck together.

~When the chunks were fully frozen again, I put them all in a large ziploc bag.

~Now whenever I plan to feed some beef heart, I just take out a couple chunks a day prior. The bottom drawer in our fridge is devoted exclusively to the dog's raw meat. I keep the meat in two glass casserole dishes in there, and usually always have chicken in larger one, and some other kind of meat in the other.

An Unfortunate Tragedy

2008-04-14T17:17:00.010-04:00

Henry spent too much time laying like this:

I tried to warn him...
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But he wouldn't listen...
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And now, he has to walk around like this:

Need A New Blog Name

2008-04-13T20:41:00.005-04:00

It has come to my attention, that the name of the blog doesn't really fit anymore. The BARF diet includes veggies and such. My dogs are actually fed pretty much 100% raw meat, so I am contemplating a new name for this blog. How about, "The Raw Meat Blog"? I am not too creative when it comes to names.

Oh by the way, want to know something funny? Me and my husband have been considering going back to being dietary vegans.

The dogs get raw meat, and the humans get a bunch of vegetables. Hmmmm....

Another seizure... (and a RANT)

2008-04-13T12:43:00.014-04:00

This time I caught the very early part of the seizure. I have never seen Henry in the very first part when the seizure hadnt kicked in. I noticed the crazy eyes first, foaming at the mouth big time, his body reminded me of a dead bent fish, all stiff and curved up. I ran to get my husband right away, by then Henry was in full blown seizure, my husband kept Henry from flying off the sofa. I ran and grabbed the bag of ice. The problem was the ice was in one big frozen lump. I should have broke the ice up right away so it would form to Henry's lower back right away. After I realized it was not working nearly as well as it should, I took the bag of ice and punched it like crazy, the bag came open and some ice came out, but I still had enough ice to work with. I pressed the bag of ice firmly onto his lower back, and presto, the seizure was over. His body is very hot. We have all the windows open and the heat off. We gave him an organic steak. Henry gets an organic steak once a week. This is an $11 steak so it's a rare treat. I think of it as a supplement.

We think it may be the antibiotic (Metronidazole) he is on. He was on this antibiotic a month ago and since then he has been having weekly seizures. We will be getting him on the best probioitic we can find. Then hopefully he will not need antibiotics anymore. Meanwhile, I am not giving him anymore antibiotics till we get ahold of the vet.

editing to add: http://www.rxlist.com/cgi/generic/metronidaz_ad.htm
WHY DIDN'T OUR VET TELL US? I call her every single time Henry has a seizure!
Meanwhile, she has us increasing his seizure meds, when all along this was caused by another med she had prescribed for him! Ack, if I gave my dog every med the vets told me to, Henry would be a mess! It would be, give him metronidazole, this triggers seizures, then give him phenobarbital, this triggers hypothyroidism, then, give him med to control the thyroid, and yada yada yada, meanwhile, the people who makes these meds, are raking in the big bucks while our dogs get sicker and sicker!

Editing agains to add: Please don't take this to mean that I think all medicine is bad. Henry will probably be on Potassium Bromide for the rest of his life. I just think we need to be careful not to overdo it, and we should use them as more of a last ditch solution. Vets and doctors tend to neglect looking at the overall health of our pets, and tend to treat only the symptom, and then our pets get sicker, and then they treat those symptoms, and etc., etc.

Probiotics

2008-04-10T08:49:00.004-04:00

*sigh* Henry has diarrhea again. We are starting another round of antibiotics from the vet. This is true diarrhea, not just softish stool. Henry has not had anything new in the last few days so I've no idea what caused it. I do know greyhounds are prone to diarrhea, and I think also his epilepsy weakens his immune system. Me and my husband have decided after Henry is done with this round of antibiotics, we will start him on probiotics. We haven't chosen yet the source yet we will buy it from. Likely we will buy it online.

2008-04-08T08:55:00.004-04:00

Tomorrow is one week of no seizures, and I can tell the increase in seizure med (potassium bromide) has kicked in. =) Side effects generally mellow when the med has reached effectiveness in doing it's job of providing seizure control. It takes a while to get to that point and isn't effective with the first dose. Henry is no longer acting like he is starving all the time, and his friskiness has come back. I no longer have to pre-chop his meat as he is taking the time to chew it better and is digesting better now. He is still on only one kind of seizure med which is good. Because of the bad experience with the raw fish, I was afraid to get into Henry trying new meats. Very slowly we are expanding Henry's diet. So far he does well with:

~chicken
~steak
~boneless pork roast
~beef heart

What we plan to try in the near future:

~pork neck
~beef tongue

Wal-Mart has chicken leg quarters for 47 cents a pound. It comes in 10 pound bags. This enables me to get some fancier cuts of meat as well. The cheapest source of red meat so far can find is an approximately 20 pound piece of chuck, unprocessed, that would come in one big lump for me to chop up myself. That would be $2.09 a pound. I am hoping I can find something better. Henry does very well with cow meat. I am going to look into eyeballs too.

By the way, if you need to chop bones, a much easier way than doing it manually with poultry scissors, is to bash the bone (while still inside a ziploc bag) with a hammer.

Spring A Prime Time For Seizures?

2008-04-03T09:22:00.002-04:00

Henry is doing well today and seems to have recovered from yesterday's grand mal. He was quite frisky this morning, lol. Alot of dogs had seizures yesterday. One died yesterday morning after two grand mals. =( It seems alot of dogs have more seizures in the spring. One lady, her dog ONLY has seizures in the spring and is fine the rest of the year. Her dog had a seizure yesterday morning too. Weird.

2008-04-02T05:33:00.003-04:00

Henry had another seizure, about 45 minutes ago. This one was the mildest of all the seizures he has ever had in our care. Thank goodness we had increased his meds!

Video #2

2008-03-27T21:53:00.007-04:00

(having technical difficulties...)
I wish I could have gotten videos of both the boys chowing down, but I wouldn't have been able to feed them at the same time if I were to get videos of them both eating, as it is not a good idea to feed dogs raw food right too close to each other, and I didnt want to have to make one of the boys wait for the other to finish.

When I don't pre-chop the bone, Henry likes to take his hunk of meat, hold it down underneath one of his paws, on the kitchen floor and tug away at it. =) I then spray the floor with vinegar, let it sit a couple minutes, and then wipe clean, and then do a second spray and wipe down. I don't use harsh cleaning products such as Lysol anymore. Dogs noses are much more sensitive than ours, so I can only imagine they are more sensitive to the smell of cleaning products than we are.

In the summer, Henry will be eating his hunks of meat outside. Riley always keeps his in his bowl as his is pre-chopped. I use poultry scissors to chop the bones up smaller.

2008-03-27T21:49:00.004-04:00

Here's a picture of what the dogs were so eagerly awaiting for. lately I have been pre chopping both the dogs's bones, (Riley is 13 so I always pre-chop his) The reason I have been pre-chopping Henry's bones is because since I increased his seizure med, he has been wolfing down his food and not taking enough time to chew, and this caused him to throw up bone chunks he did not chew enough. As Henry gets used to the increase in his med, he will not wolf down his food as much. I don't chop the bones real fine, just to smaller pieces.

Video #1

2008-03-27T21:26:00.003-04:00

I got a new camera today! =) I took this video right before feeding time. The boys aren't impressed with my new camera, lol. They wanted me to put the camera away and FEED them!

They got beef heart for the first time today. The heart was frozen. I thawed it *just* enough that I could carve it with an electric knife, then I cut the heart into chunks the size of half a fist, and bagged up the chunks.

I was told to save the blood as I was carving the heart up. That's why there's blood in the bowls. The blood is good for them. *gag*

I am a little self conscious about my voice, so I want to explain, if my voice sounds kinda different, or any of my pronounciation is off, I am partially deaf.

And While On The Topic Of Water....

2008-03-22T08:39:00.001-04:00

I cant imagine it's good for our dogs either. I haven't reviewed the actual video yet. (I'll have to get my husband to do it later as I am deaf)

Update: My husband watched it, he said the video mentioned dogs as well. Very interesting video.

Bottled Water

2008-03-22T08:32:00.002-04:00

As well as increasing Henry's meds, we have decided to give Henry bottled water only. We know of a place that has the purest water and specializes in water only. That's where we will get our water from.

On a side note, since starting raw, I have noticed my boys don't need as much water.

=(

2008-03-21T16:12:00.006-04:00

Well we know for sure now the ice bag trick does help. Henry just had an EXTREMELY violent grand mal. He was convulsing so badly I could hardly even lay a hand on him. Jaw wide open, urine flying everywhere, his body shaking so violent, legs everywhere. Words cant do it justice to describe it to you. My husband wasn't home and I was so stunned I forgot about the ice bag trick at first. I thought to myself that Henry is going to die right now. Then I remembered the ice bag trick, went flying into the kitchen, sent food flying, grabbed the ice bag, shoved it between Henry's lower back and the sofa, and presto, within two seconds he stopped convulsing so violently, but then he went into a new state. He just lied there, still rigid, defeceating, foaming at the mouth, flinching very hard at any little sound, and his eyes looked like he was dead in there. I gave Henry a phenobarb pill, (leftover from several months ago, he's not actually on phenobarbital anymore) It was a scary thing to go through withut my husband, and I had a panic attack shortly after the grand mal was done. My husband is home now, and I have calmed down. (mostly) Henry is resting on the sofa. (see picture above) We will be increasing his meds. This just isn't reasonable and I'm afraid one of these days a seizure really will kill him.

Does Your Dog Have Seizures? Read This!

2008-03-21T09:26:00.006-04:00

From~ http://www.canine-epilepsy-guardian-angels.com/emergencycare.html

There is some exciting news, however, about a new technique that has recently been published in a prestigious veterinary journal. This technique may be able to help you shorten or even abort (stop before it begins) your pup's seizure, and may even help reduce the amount of post-ictal recovery time, and to return your pup to full functioning more quickly.
The technique was tested both in an ER and a regular veterinary hospital as well as by people in their own homes, on 51 epileptic dogs. In all 51 cases, the technique either aborted or shortened the usual duration of the seizure, and in many cases, the post-ictal recovery time was also shortened. These results were published in an article by H. C. Gurney, DVM, and Janice Gurney, B.S., M.A. The article is entitled, "A Simple, Effective Technique for Arresting Canine Epileptic Seizures." It appeared in The Journal of the American Holistic Veterinary Medical Association, in the January-March 2004 issue, pages 17-18.
Probably the most exciting part of this discovery is that the technique is not in any way harmful to your pup, and it does not involve giving extra medications. It is as simple as applying a bag of ice to the lower-midsection of your pup's back, and holding the bag firmly in position until the seizure ends. The exact area on the back is between the 10th thoracic (chest) and 4th lumbar (lower back) vertebrae (bones in the spine); what this means is that the top of the ice bag should rest just above the middle of your pup's back, following along the spine, and drape down to the lower-midsection of the back. To see a very good diagram of where the thoracic and lumbar vertebrae meet on a dog's spine, go to:
http://www.takingthelead.co.uk/3/Anatomy/skelton.htm

Look for numbers 13 and 14 on the diagram. Number 13 on the diagram is the13th thoracic (chest) vertebrae (there are 13 total); count back toward the head to number 10: that is your start point for the ice bag. Number 14 on the diagram is the 1st lumbar (lower back) vertebrae (there are 7 total); count toward the tail to number 4: that is your end point for the ice bag.
With a properly sized ice bag, you should not have to worry about being too exact: aim for the middle of the back, and the correct area will be covered. Application of ice to other areas of the body (head, neck, legs and other areas of the spine) was not found to be effective. Ice bags on the middle of the back was the only area found to work.
The article reports that the sooner the ice is applied, the better the results. So you should have the ice ready and prepared: if you have a small dog, fill a small-sized (quart) Ziploc freezer bag with cubed or crushed ice and keep it in a particular spot in your freezer. If you have a large dog, use a large-sized (gallon) bag. You can also freeze water into a block in the bag. When you hear or see a seizure begin, run for the ice or, if you live with another person, have one person run for the ice while the other runs to help the pup. Place the ice bag in the lower midsection of your pup's back and hold it there firmly until the seizure stops. If this technique works as reported, your pup's seizure should not be as long as usual and you may also see an improvement in the duration of the post-ictal period.
The article reports that people who tried using a bag of frozen vegetables instead of ice had less success than those who used ice, so keep a bag of ice at the ready. The article also indicated that dogs with cluster seizures are a special case and may need their usual protocols after the seizure, so if your pup has cluster seizures, follow your veterinarian's instructions for using valium.
And, the article does not discuss using ice after a seizure, only during the seizure itself and also states that you remove the ice the minute the seizure is over. If you can get to an ice bag during a seizure, you might be able better to assess if this will work for your pup or not. During a seizure, most dogs should not be distracted by the ice.

I did this with Henry while he was having a grand mal seizure on March 11th. Henry has extremely violent seizures. The seizure ended within a few seconds of applying the ice. It lasted only one minute. Coincidence or not I don't know, but there's no harm in trying!

Henry is 90% better =)

2008-03-17T17:54:00.004-04:00

Whoops, I havent updated have I? Sorry! Yesterday Henry finally made a nice NORMAL bowel movement! =D He is still doing quite a bit of the mild flycatcher seizures. But everyday he has less and less of those. He is back on his normal diet. Except now I do not feed meat and veggie mush at the same time. I feed the veggie mush as a small snack in the middle of the day.

2008-03-14T21:22:00.008-04:00

Guess what sweet Henry did today?

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He mutilated his very first stuffy! =O

".....as your attorney...I'm advising you to not admit to anything...pretend the cat did it. I've noticed the gypsy gerbils or gang gerbil intiation is really taking off on here...try that one also...but don't say a word...let me do the talking."

A Good Example Of Why It Pays To Research..

2008-03-12T12:37:00.005-04:00

Yesterday when my vet explained to me about the raw fish, I told her I like to research everything and to please write down in my notebook the basic terms of what she was telling me. I then came home and googled away. Thiaminase kills off vitamin B and thiamin. I found out many dogs with epilepsy benefit from B6 supplements. Henry had fly catcher seizures all morning. Too many to count. These are a much milder form of seizures than grand mal, but we were obviously concerned it was going to lead to another grand mal. I then had the thought of perhaps we need to get the Vitamin B and thiamin back in him to undo the nuerological damage of the fish. We called the vet, and she said that was a good idea and to look for a Vitamin B-Complex vitamin that contains thiamin and is ideally derived from natural not synthetic sources and is in capsule form. So my husband immediately went and got Henry the vitamins. Henry has had one vitamin so far. We opened the capsule and sprinkled it onto his food.

It is always good to ask questions and pursue more options! =)

Aha!

2008-03-11T19:23:00.005-04:00

It's the FISH!!!! I gave Henry some fish for breakfast the day before his 'twitchies' started. I always knew those twitchies were somehow connected to the epilepsy. Raw fish has thiaminase. This destroys thiamin and vitamin B and can trigger seizures. So if you dog has epilepsy, I highly reccomend you never feed them fish. Anyways, the fish just basically messed everything up, and weakened his immune system and so he got diarhhea. Greyhounds are more prone to diarhhea than most breeds.

Me and my husband are glad everything worked out the way it did. because it happened on exactly this day, when the other vet was closed, we were able to find this vet, who was AWESOME! She is not against raw and was happy to hear how it had helped Henry. She was supportive of my desire to get Henry off the last of his seizure med and see if the BARF diet does the trick. She was just flat out fantastic and my husband quickly told me when the vet stepped out for a minute that he wanted her to be Henry's new vet. She has two greyhounds of her own, and she is knowledgable about greyhound's bloodwork being different and all that stuff.

God was able to make some good come out of this in how we were able to find this vet! =)

Henry is going on a 24 hour fast. Then he will be fed small meals of a mixture of white rice and plain defatted chicken three times a day for three days. It cant be brown rice, it had to be white rice. I was leery of grains, but Henry's rectum is so swollen and painful. So I want to take care of that first, then we'll get back to a grain free diet....WITH NO RAW FISH!

Henry will continue with the antibiotics we got from the other vet.

She didn't want to do the thyroid panel when Henry was sick, so we will make another appt. in about a month for the thyroid panel, and do heartworm meds at that time. She is specially ordering the exact brand of heartworm med we want for Henry. Which is *plain* Heartgard, not Heartgard *Plus*.

Grand mal =(

2008-03-11T06:38:00.005-04:00

Henry had a grand mal at 5:37 am. It wasn't quite as severe as last time, but still pretty bad. This time his mouth didn't lock open. His legs paddled, his mouth foamed, his back and neck arched backwards, his whole boddy rattled like an out of balance washing machine and he peed and pouped. The poup was actually semi soft this time, not pure liquid as it had been. The post seizure phase was not as bad this time.

Two things I did that I think really helped:

~large bag of ice held firmly against lower back. The seizure happened to stop within a few seconds when I did that. Coincidence or not I dont know. This has worked for others as well.

~spoonful of Breyer's all natural vanilla ice cream as soon as he was able to work his mouth to be able to eat it.

He did act blind afterwards like he did last time. But he hardly ran at all. He paced, but did not run like last time. Henry is capable of running at very high speeds due to his breed so I am so glad he did not do the running thing because that does not go well with him not being able to avoid running into things.

He is on the sofa resting comfortably in his jammies.

We we're certainly better prepared this time.

Another update

2008-03-10T21:34:00.003-04:00

Yesterday we came home to Henry having diarhhea. He jumped the gate, something he had never done before, and had diarhhea in 3 rooms. =( This morning he got half his normal size meal~lean boneless turkey breast and yogurt. Then had more diarhhea. =( Today we got two different meds from the vet. One is metrozondale<--sp? (an antibiotic), and the other is Loperamide, which is basically Immodium.

Stanislaw, the comment you left to my last entry, thank you so much. It really helped to hear that you went through the same thing and got through it without having to give up the BARF diet. Me and my husband were really beginning to worry BARF would not work out for Henry.

Neither me or my husband can stand the idea of making Henry go back to kibble. We would employ other ideas first before going back to kibble. Such as Honest Kitchen's dehydrated raw or homecooked or something of that nature.

Riley meanwhile, is just the opposite. Not a single problem with the transition. He never threw up even once. His stools were a little too hard at first. That was easily fixed by giving less bone.

Mini update...

2008-03-06T20:31:00.004-05:00

Henry has not had anymore diarhea, but he also has not made a bowel movement. He doesnt act like he is in distress, but I know dogs are better at hiding it than we are. If he doesnt make a b.m. by noon tomorrow we will go to the vet. Other wise, we will be going as previously scheduled, on the 19th. If Henry keeps yo-yoing with the bowel movements, I am wondering if he'd do better with a home cooked diet? (this would be lower fat) We'll see what the new vet has to say. Riley meanwhile, is doing excellent on the barf diet and having no problems. He's 13, but you sure can't tell! =)

Laziest dog ever...

2008-03-05T20:09:00.007-05:00

I snapped this sweet picture of Henry just a few minutes ago. =) I lifted the blankie a little bit for this picture. He really likes to be snuggled up. We will tuck him in before we go grocery shopping or etc., and come home to find him still all snuggledy under his blankie.

Mabel takes good care of Henry. =)

I had posted a while ago about Henry having a scar under one of his eyes and I wondered if it had something to do with his being head shy, This is the scar I was speaking of.

This is a picture of when we were at my husband's sisters house in Florida. The shaggy dog is my sister in law's. She tried her best to get Henry to get up. She was bouncing all over and barking and showing him her toys. He was too lazy, lol! Her name is Ginger. I think Ginger was wondering what was wrong with Henry and thinking surely he can't be a dog, he's much too laid back!

Some livelier pictures: (Henry only sleeps 23 1/2 hours a day, not all 24)

Rachael Ray makes homemade meals for pets...

2008-03-05T16:22:00.004-05:00

I just got this info through the K9 nutrition group at Yahoo:

Rachael Ray Feeds Your Pets
This hour-long prime time special combines two of Rachael Ray's greatest passions: food and animals.

Rachael prepares three homemade recipes for her beloved dog, Isaboo, who gobbles them right up!

Rachael Ray Feeds Your Pets entertains and informs as it brings
practical advice about safe and nutritious food for your pets

AIR TIMES:
March 08, 2008 9:00 PM ET/PT
March 09, 2008 12:00 AM ET/PT
March 09, 2008 3:00 AM ET/PT
March 14, 2008 8:00 PM ET/PT
March 15, 2008 3:00 AM ET/PT
March 15, 2008 7:00 PM ET/PT
March 16, 2008 6:00 PM ET/PT

http://www.foodnetwork.com/food/show_sp/episode/0,1976,FOOD_9994_55840,00.html
Sounds interesting! =)

yawn

2008-03-05T09:11:00.003-05:00

Boy, last nght was a long night. Henry passed HORRIBLE gas all night long. I got up twice to give him some Rescue Remedy and prayed over him. This morning after breakfast, he made a HUGE pile of softish stool. He is presently sleeping in his nest bed in our room where it's nice & quiet. (my husband keeps an ear out for him in case he has a seizure) I gave him fresh tilipia for breakfast Monday morning. I wonder if it was the tilipia? I am considering giving the cornish hen to Riley and giving Henry something else. But it seems if he had a problem with the cornish hen he'd have trouble with all poultry? There is also a small chance Henry ate some play-doh. Hopefully this episode is over. If he has more diarhea, we will be going ot the vet sooner.

I am also considering feeding him ONLY his meat and supplements at breakfast and supper and do veggies fruit in the middle of the day as a snack. Read my post about veggies for more info about that.

I am going to seek some advice from the K9 nutrtion group at Yahoo. If anyone can give me some advice, I'd appreciate it. =)

MINI UPDATE: I think Henry may be better. I dont know for sure till I see a normal stool. We went for our usual walk, and he *seemed* fine. He is sleeping alot, but then again he always does that. His twitchiness is now almost non existant, and my house smells so much better today, lol! No veggies/fruit, fish or organ meat for supper. Just plain low fat chicken breasts and some bones. It seems he is going to get through this without a grand mal. (I hope I am not speaking too soon on that)

2008-03-04T17:01:00.000-05:00

A little update since I haven't posted in a while. Riley is doing fantastic. Henry generally does better, but yesterday the twitchies came back again, and today he is passing an enormous amount of gas. He used to have the twitchies all the time, so this is still definately an improvement. =) Last time he had a grand mal was Dec. 9th and he passed an enormous amount of gas before that day and night too, and then seized at 4 am. He stopped passing gas after the grand mal. I've no idea what the connection is. His seizures are generally 3 months apart. March 9th will be 3 months. We are praying that he never does have another seizure. Next vet appt. is supposed to be March 19th, but we may make it sooner. He did get a new meat these last two days, cornish game hens. But he did fine with turkey and chicken so I'm not sure why cornish game hen would be a problem? I'll update if Henry has a seizure, or if he gets past the twitchiness/passing gas without a grand mal.

Did you know...

2008-02-25T22:21:00.001-05:00

That many dogs who eat raw, usually do not need dentals? That is such a huge plus to be able to avoid having your dog go under anesthesia! You save money and your dog doesn't have to go through the stress! =) The bones do have to be left unground in order to get this benefit though. (PLEASE READ EDIT AT BOTTOM, FOUND NEW INFO) Riley's teeth are improving. Everyday he gets better at chewing bones. He gets boneless meat, some ground bones, and then some chicken neck. He eats the easy stuff first, then he takes his time with the neck. The neck is cleaning his teeth and improving Riley's overall dental health. Dogs with severe dental disease are more prone to a whole host of illnesses, such as heart disease, kidney disease and etc.

Quoting from http://www.dr-dan.com/dental.htm

Bacteria, Bacteria, Bacteria...

Loads of bacteria find their way into the circulation every day. These bacteria can form cute little cauliflower-like growths on the delicate valve leaflets in the heart. I see so many old Poodles with rotten teeth and heart murmors. I can't see inside, but I often summise that these aquired valve leaks are the result of the bacterial threat from their chronic dental disease. Unfortunately, open heart surgery to repair the valves isn't in my line of expertise or the usual pet owners' budget.

Second problem... If bacteria are constantly causing a threat to the body the animals immune system has to fight them off or die of overwhelming bacterial septicemia. While fighting off the bacterial invasion from the teeth, globulins are formed (a protein) by the animals' immune system. Excess quantities of globulins (or proteins) can plug the tiny filters in the kidneys and cause a condition called amyloidosis. Kidneys are an essential organ needed to maintain life. Once they are destroyed there is no regeneration! Without a kidney transpant the animal will die.

EDITING TO ADD: I am hearing that the bone chewing is NOT the only thing that benefits dental health, it seems the greatest benEfit to raw is that there is no grain (if you don't add it that is). Grain apparently sticks to the teeth and causes decay. Which I think makes perfect sense. Raw doesnt stick to teeth like kibble does.

I'm so excited!!!! =)

2008-02-25T15:17:00.000-05:00

I just talked with Henry's new vet and made an appt. She does both natural and conventional medicine, the best of both worlds, and she is pro BARF! =D We are going to have a FULL thyroid panel done, and have Henry's bromide levels checked. Then we will talk about supplements we are using, see what she suggests, what other things we can do and so on. My last vet would have nothing to do with supplements or BARF. He just wanted to drug Henry to the max. =(

The appt. is set for March 19th at 1:30 pm and I can guarantee you will hear all about the appt.! =D (the appt. was set on ths date to be three months from last thyroid check plus one month of new diet, which we started on the 16th)

Pictures of the boys dinner...

2008-02-24T19:44:00.000-05:00

Henry's supper: part of a chicken back, breast, whole egg, cooked and mashed spinach and carrots, kelp, fish oil capsule, vitamin E capsule (you can see the capsules in the veggies), Potassium Bromide (a prescription med for controlling seizures)

Riley's supper: Chicken neck, breast, whole egg, cooked and mashed spinach and carrots

(Click on the pictures for full size)

A note: The boys stools were very hard. I found reducing the amount of bone and increasing the veggies a little did the trick.

Henry Played With A Toy!!!!!!!!!!!!

2008-02-23T12:47:00.000-05:00

This is a biggie!!!! =) You see, Henry is the kind of dog that rarely wags his tail. He always had such a sadness about him, and a very loving sweet nature about him. It breaks your heart and makes you love him all the more so much you feel like your heart could burst with all the love.

There is no doubt Henry had a horrible life his first five years. He was rescued from a shelter he had been dumped at by his owner. He was 20 lbs underweight, nails severely overgrown and scheduled to be put to sleep that day. A lady from a Weimaraner rescue came to the shelter to pick up a weimaraner, and saw Henry. Though Henry is not a weimaraner, she just could not leave him to die. She knew he was a real treasure.

Right away Henry started to have cluster grand mals. They did their best to treat him and did not give up. Henry was severely head shy, and petrified of leashes. His original foster parents worked wonders on Henry with his fear of leashes. Henry has to be the absolute most well behaved dog on the leash ever. A dog cannot be better behaved on the leash than Henry. Equally well behaved maybe, but not better. Henry stays exactly by my left side. He stays so close, his collar is always right by my hand. He is always looking up at me on our walks, checking on me.

Henry went through multiple greyhound rescue groups, and was in rescue for over two years.

Henry is a greyhound/coonhound mix. In Ohio they have coondog trials, and they race the coondogs, thus greyhound/coonhound mixes became popular. But these dogs rarely get a decent life. =( Henry's old name was 'Speedy', and he was first rescued in northern Ohio.

Many of these dogs are trained to run faster by running along side vehicles while on leashes on back roads. One side of Henry's face has multiple scars, including a long one under his left eye. (sorry, doesn't show up in these pictures, I'll take a picture later and post it) He also has some broken/missing teeth on that side. After a long walk in the cold, his front leg on that side starts to hurt. I suspect Henry was injured while running alongside a vehicle on a leash. And I suspect he was severely head shy because either someone hit him repeatedly and/or somene stitched his face up themselves rather than take him to a vet, so as to save money. I'll come back and post more on this later, I need to take the dogs for their walk right now. =)

Here I am trying to catch a picture of Henry playing. Of course, as soon as I get the camera out, he stops playing! Lol!

This picture turned out blue for some reason, but here he is rolling the ball with his snout. Henry had just dropped the ball out of his mouth in this picture.
GOTCHA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! =D

Day 7

2008-02-22T19:37:00.000-05:00

Today our dogs have green stool, and Henry is twitchy again. I noticed him acting like he was snapping at flies in the air, except I know he was not doing that. I did add canned pumpkin last night. I am going to hope taking pumpkin out will do the trick.

Henry's Improvement

2008-02-21T10:04:00.000-05:00

I want to share an observation we have made about Henry. Henry used to frequently act as if he was about to go in seizure, but not necessarily always go in seizure. He'd become very flinchy and his legs would start a sort of paddle motion and his mouth would start opening and closing, but he was still very aware of his environment. Me or my husband would call each other and we'd sit by him and pray and wait, and it would never really start.

We adopted him 4 months ago, he has had one grand mal in our care, and it was terrible. He sounded like an out of balance washing machine on the spin cycle. His legs paddled furiously, and it looked like his jaw was going to break because it was locked open so wide, and he made the same vibration in his throat as our Alfalfa did when he took his last breaths and died. And yes he defeceated and urinated. For an hour and ten minutes afterwards, he RAN! And his brain did not seem to compute not bumping into things, and he was frantically smashing into walls and furniture very hard. I went outside with him. This was 3 o'clock in the morning, I stood there in the freezing cold and cried as Henry ran back and forth in the yard, running into the fence, the swing set, and the garage. (It was impossible to stop him, I tried) Then we went inside, and we both slept on a large sleeping bag in the family room. It took Henry several days to get back to what was considered normal for him. We took Henry to the vet the next morning, and it turned out he had a urinary tract infection. For your normal dog, a urinary tract infection does not trigger a grand mal. A dog who has epilepsy basically has a much lower threshold for environmental/physical stresses and will as a result seize.

Many of you may have noticed I did not take Henry in to the emergency vet right away. If your dog has not been diagnosed with idiopathic epilepsy as Henry has, and had as many diagnosable causes as possible ruled out, you need to get your dog/cat to a vet IMMEDIATELY if they have a seizure, as they may have been poisoned or somethng of that nature. Henry has been diagnosed with idiopathic epilepsy, so many tests have already been done on him trying to determine the cause. According to the vet, nothing really causes them, they just happen, but I disagree. I think non diagnosable causes are causing the seizures. Such as the kibble, vaccinations and etc.

If your dog has been diagnosed with idiopathic epilepsy, your vet will give you guidelines on when you should bring in your dog.

Not all dogs who have seizures seize this badly. We had another dog with epilepsy and his seizures were so much milder. Fortunately, this was Henry's first grand mal where he did not cluster. I believe this was due to a new med he was on, Potassium Bromide. Can you imagine if he would have gone on to have two or three more seizures like that within a short time? When Henry was on phenobarbital and valium, he still continued to have multiple seizures, but they were a day apart instead of an hour apart, which was some improvement, but not enough. The Potassium Bromide was added, and the side effects became unbearable. So we kept Henry on the med that was making the biggest difference,(potassium bromide) and under our vet's supervision, we weaned him off the phenobarbital very slowly. His side effects are much more bearable now. Alot of dogs who have clusters seem to do very well with Potassium Bromide. There's some trial and error involved in figuring it all out.

Anyways, now that I have described how severe Henry's seizures are, you can understand why we were so frantic about him having another. We sincerely hope Henry never has to go through that again. Anyways, about when Henry would act like he was about to go in seizure, but then never actually go in seizure, since we started the BARF diet, Henry has not done this at all! His shakiness is all gone, and I swear, all involuntary movements seem to have dissapeared. This used to be a daily occurence that he would become twitchy and almost go in seizure but not actually go in siezure, and it was getting progressively worse in the weeks before we started the BARF diet.

I really think we started the BARF diet just in time before things would have gotten much worse.

Me and my husband are quite relieved to see Henry doing so well, and that both boys made it through the diet transition just fine! =)

Day 4

2008-02-19T17:48:00.001-05:00

The dogs seem to have fully adjusted to the new diet. Their stools are 100% healthy now, with no mucus. Their stools are also only half the size they used to be, and they have only making bowel movements once a day now, instead of twice a day.

This afternoon, I took apart a whole chicken, getting as much meat off the bones as possible and putting the bones in the food processor. The food processor does not do the best job though. I had to hand cut several pieces smaller. Now Riley has six meals worth of crushed bone all ready for him so I dont have to grind them each meal. I will add the preground bones to whole pieces of boneless meat. We will go out tomorrow to a hunting store and pick up a metal hand cranked meat grinder and see how that works. Then I intend to premake lots of patties for Riley at once and freeze extra.

About Henry, who is able to chew the bones, I have found it better to give him big pieces and let him chew away at one big piece. I lay out a plastic table cloth cut in half and he holds the hunk of meat under one of his paws and tears away at it. Right now he takes about 15 minutes to eat. I like that he does not rush. After he is done with his chicken, he eats from his bowl the veggie mash that I add his medicine and supplements to. When it is warm, I will have him eat outside. Riley just eats all of his from his bowl as it is already pre ground for him.

What I find so satisying about raw is there is so little waste! When I prepare chicken for my family, all the bones and etc. get thrown away. With the the dogs, the skin is the only thing I throw away. I don't know if most people feed the skin as well, but I remove the skin because Riley is older and Henry is on a medicine that makes him more prone to pancreatitis.

Henry has either stopped passing gas, or his passing gas no longer has any odor since starting the BARF diet. That's a huge plus! =D

2008-02-18T20:48:00.001-05:00

Whew! It has been busy around our house! I keep meaning to post more in depth but something keeps coming up that I need to tend to.

About the chewing of bones, Henry is handling that just fine, and it turns out he does not need his meat ground. It's actually a blessing that the meat grinder broke cause that forced me to find out Henry could handle the bones after all, and Henry will get more taurine this way which is good for epilepsy. But unfortunately, Riley who is 13 and has eaten kibble his whole life (kibble is bad for teeth) simply is not able to chew the bones without difficulty and much assistance from me. Today I ground up his meat in the food processor, but that really pulverized the meat to a baby food texture almost. I worry this reduces the good stuff in there.

My plan is tomorrow morning to only grind bones in the food processor, and then serve the meat in cube size pieces. This is rather time consuming as I figure this all out. But I will figure out a better system, and I will be sure to share with you all what I end up doing.

Right now some options I am considering are:

Getting a manual meat grinder for only $40.00. Meat grinders don't pulverize the meat like food processors do. I can't afford an all steel electric grinder right now.
ordering ground turkey/chicken necks from Oma's pride, and then adding them to boneless meat.
My least favorite option is buy pre-made ground BARF patties from the pet store. This is the most processed and most costly option, but it is also the easiest.
Stanislaw left a comment suggesting I marinate in apple cider to soften the bones. I am worried that the vinegar may eat up the good amino acids and stuff?

Meanwhile, we haven't gone beyond chicken yet, as chicken has the softest bones, and I dont think my food processor can handle harder bones. I think I will have to mix chicken bones ground in food processor and then add it to another kind of meat so Riley can have some variety. Stanislaw from I Eat Raw Meat has been posting their menu, so I think I will go over there and take a look at what is on their menu for some ideas. =)

Day 3

2008-02-18T13:59:00.000-05:00

No diarhea, both dogs made bowel movements on noon walk. Somewhat mucousy, but nice and hard. A little lighter in color. Other than yesterday's small throw up from Henry, there has been no more throwing up. Transition seems to be going perfectly smooth! =)

It feels so good to put all natural unprocessed foods in their bowls. I believe idiopathic epilepsy is often (not always) simply having a lower threshold of tolerance for toxins than other dogs. So I cringed at putting dry kibble in Henry's bowl, wondering if that was much of the problem behind his seizures. I cringe at the thought of giving Henry heartworm medicine when it warms up, but my hope is since his body will be so much more detoxified due to this very natural diet, perhaps the heartworms pills wont do as much damage. I know Henry having to endure treatment for heartworm infestation would be much worse than the preventative.

A note about Riley, he has had a crusty wart thing on his face since September. Last night, much of it crumbled off. =) I wonder if it has something to do with the diet?

Day 2

2008-02-17T21:36:00.001-05:00

No diarhea yet, Riley made 2 normal bowel movements, at his regular times. Henry made a normal bowel movement this morning, but none tonight. Henry threw up at 6:30 pm, a rather small amount. There were some chewed up bones in the vomit, none were longer than an inch. Not sure if he threw up cause the bones needed to be more chewed up, or if it was because the raw meeting the old kibble in his tummy didn't agree with each other. He eats at 7:30 am and 7:30 pm sharp every day. (due to meds must be every 12 hours with food) So this was 11 hours after his last meal.

Since starting the new diet, the dogs take much more interest in what I am doing in the kitchen. =) Henry actually howls when I prepare the food. I had never heard him do that before. It is so cool to hear the way a coonhound howls. I probably wouldn't feel the same way if I had full hearing, lol. (I am deaf, but hear low pitches some)

First B.A.R.F. Feeding

2008-02-16T21:53:00.001-05:00

We had originally planned to grind our dog's raw meat and bones. Riley is 13 and his teeth are not in good shape. Henry is missing 2 molars, 1 front, and has 2 broken canines that are broken very low down. All those broken teeth are on one side of his mouth, the same side of his mouth that has a whole bunch of scars, which leads me to think he had an injury there. Anyways, back to the story. I get all my goods laid out. The meat, my poultry scissors, the meat grinder, and I start to grind the meat. The meat grinder broke almost immediately! So, there we were. Our hearts set on feeding the dogs raw. Determined, I proceeded to hand chop the meat with the scissors. My husband noticed that I didn't seem to be having that hard a time cutting through the meat. So, per my wonderful and very supportive husband's suggestion, I one piece at a time, slowly let the dogs eat their meat and bones unground. Henry at first tried to chew a little on either side, then quickly figured out one side worked much better than the other, and then did all the rest of his chewing on that side. He did a good job of taking his time, and thoroughly chewing everything. Riley attempted to chew the first piece, and we could see he was having some difficulty. After that first piece, he seemed to resort to swallowing it as whole as possible, which has me rather nervous. We shall see what happens with that.So anyways, there you have it, our first experience of feeding raw! =)

"Whew! That was GOOD!"

Figuring Out The Cost...

2008-02-16T16:18:00.001-05:00

OK, so I wanted to share our first grocery shopping reciept for B.A.R.F.

$6.85 for 8.35lbs chicken (2 whole chickens, 82 cents a lb at Wal-Mart)
$1.17 for 1.22lb yam
$3.08 12oz. frozen blueberries
-------------------
$11.10 for approx. 5 days worth for 130 lbs of dog. Not bad!

~
Supplements for 1 large dog: (totally optional, I wouldn't even use any at all on a healthy dog)
$6.24 for 150 fish oil capsules, 75 days worth at 2 a day
$4.97 for 100 Vitamin E softgels, 50 days worth
$37.50 (that inc. s&h) kelp, 96 days worth<--kelp can be found for much cheaper by the way

We Are Starting!!!!!!

2008-02-16T11:58:00.000-05:00

The kelp has arrived!!!!! We are eating our lunch, then we will go out to Sam's Club and pick up some whole chicken, blueberries and yams and at 7:30 pm tonight, our dogs will get their first raw meal! I am so excited but I'd be lying if I didn't say I was a tiny bit nervous, especially that the transition period could trigger a grand mal seizure. (Henry has idiopathic epilepsy) Could you please keep my furbabies in your prayers as they make this transition and go through the detox period?

The Delay

2008-02-12T17:11:00.000-05:00

Sorry for the delay in starting the BARF diet. We are still waiting on that kelp. See, the amount of chloride in Henry's food must remain consistent because of his seizure medication, Potassium Bromide. Kelp has quite a bit of chloride in it. Since I plan to add kelp I must wait until the kelp arrives before starting the B.A.R.F. diet, and I must add the exact same amount of kelp to every single meal. I will only be giving Henry a half the reccomended amount of kelp to begin with, so as not to throw his seizure med dose off too much at once. I am trying to keep the chloride level similar to his old diet. I placed the order 10 days ago, on the same day as I ordered the meat grinder, and it still has not arrived.

The B.A.R.F. Blog

Riley Has Passed On

Henry On His Walk

A General Update

Latest Entry At Healthy Hounds

Valium Is Our Best Friend Today

An Update~

Home From Vet After a Cluster Of 5 Grand-Mals

What May Have Been The Trigger

=(

One Month Of NO Grand-Mals!!! Woo Hooo!!!!!!!

Someone Asked~Which Helped Most, Chiropractic Or Homecooked?

In Loving Memory Of Alfalfa

Another Chiropractic Adjustment..

WOW!!!

Ocular Compression

Prayers and Good Thoughts Appreciated

Update...

And Another...

Another...

New Epilepsy Awareness Blog!

Starting A New Blog Soon...

Figuring Henry Out More & More

Well, He Made It 23 Days This Time

Common Ice Pack Mistakes

Sixteen Days!

Two Weeks!

Update

Detoxing?

Fly Catcher Seizures Have Stopped

About The Antibiotic Free Meat...

My First Homecooked Meal!

Starting Full Home Cooked!!!!!

How The Ice Pack Eases Post-Ictal (dramatically!)

Another Grand-Mal & Making A Diet Change

Birthday Cake Fit For A Hound

The Official Correct Place For The Ice Pack!!!!

What The Ice Pack Does

Veggiegoop

Survey Of How Epi-Pups Did On BARF or Raw

*sigh* Reset the ticker

Cocoa Mulch Is Toxic To Dogs

Bailey

Going camping!

WANTED! Blog Links About Epilepsy &/Or Greyhounds

This Lady Needs Help ASAP

Made It 19 days This Time

Tagged-6 Word Memoir

TWO WEEKS!!! =D

Bug Repellant

Heartworm Preventative

Another update...

Update

Another seizure

By The Way...

Picture Of Ice Pack

=(

Another One =(

Potassium Bromide & Tummy Upsets

Processing Beef Heart

An Unfortunate Tragedy

Need A New Blog Name

Another seizure... (and a RANT)

Probiotics

Spring A Prime Time For Seizures?

Video #2

Video #1

And While On The Topic Of Water....

Bottled Water

=(

Does Your Dog Have Seizures? Read This!

Henry is 90% better =)

A Good Example Of Why It Pays To Research..

Aha!

Grand mal =(

Another update

Mini update...

Laziest dog ever...

Rachael Ray makes homemade meals for pets...

*yawn*

sigh Reset the ticker

yawn