Please Think Good Thoughts For Fintan

[macoduck]

Apparently he is burping a lot. So the vet agreed Pepcid would be best.

Repeating: Phazyme, Mylanta Gas (not regular Mylanta) or Gas-X. They contain simethicone which helps reduce gas.

 

I give my dogs Pepcid for stomach upset but GasX or Phazyme is better for helping with burpy gas.

[Sorcha]

Repeating: Phazyme, Mylanta Gas (not regular Mylanta) or Gas-X. They contain simethicone which helps reduce gas.

 

I give my dogs Pepcid for stomach upset but GasX or Phazyme is better for helping with burpy gas.

Ok, I will let the petsitter know.

[Guest RMarie]

How's Fintan this morning?

[Sorcha]

The pet sitter arrived at my house around 6 am and Fintan was fine. She kept him on leash outside and per my request did not feed him breakfast. I figure if his stomach is so full, there is no sense adding to it. I asked her to add another visit today in the early afternoon. I will be back at dinner time and plan to feed him rice and plain chicken.

 

I had horrible dreams last night, dreamt that Fin died.

[Guest RMarie]

I can imagine. I'm glad you didn't receive any bad news this morning.

[Charlies_Dad]

Only seeing this now. Wow, that is scary. I'm glad Fintin is doing better this morning. I agree no feeding him today and hope it was just a serious gas issue.

[Neighsayer]

Glad he is better. Hope it lasts!

[galgrey]

[cleptogrey]

white lights for fintan. i don't want to suggest any treatment,even w/ 40+ years of dog ownership i still go to my vet for treatment- that's why we have vets. hope things turn around very quickly.

Edited November 10, 2013 by cleptogrey

[BatterseaBrindl]

For continued improvement.

[EllenEveBaz]

Keeping all paws crossed here.

[Remolacha]

glad he seemed fine when the petsitter got there this morning! I hope it was just a lot of gas. This sort of thing is bad enough to have to deal with, so much worse when you are not there.

[Guest chickenpotpie]

How scary prayers for Fintan continued improvement!

[DesiRayMom]

Just now catching up on your ordeal. I would have been a -t-o-t-a-l- wreck. Praying that all is well. Be home safe & soon!

[queenwinniesmom]

I know you'll feel much better when you are able to be at home with your sweet boy. Hope he is doing okay. Let us know.

[Sorcha]

I arrived home an hour or so ago. Fintan seems fine. I have a CD of his x-rays from the e-vet so if he has another episode of whatever that was, there will be something to compare to.

 

Thanks again for everyone's thoughts and concerns, much appreciated.

[Guest IrskasMom]

Adding my good Thoughts for Fintan . I hope your regular Vet can get to the Bottom of this . Will be looking for an Update and good Report

[Beachbum1]

yikes.......you must have exploded grey hairs overnight.

 

Glad to hear he is doing OK.

[4My2Greys]

I came back to check on Fintan. I'm glad to read he hasn't had any more of those scary episodes.

[Guest skirtinthedirt]

Hi,

 

I made an account specifically to reply to this thread.

 

I am an emergency veterinary technician, who also happens to own a wonderful greyhound.

 

Did the emergency doctor try to open his mouth? What you are describing sounds to me much more like a mouth issue than a stomach issue. Does Fintan chew on sticks, etc? How are his teeth? It is not uncommon for young dogs to develop an abcess behind a molar, usually from foreign material they have chewed on. This causes extreme pain upon opening the mouth or chewing on hard food, etc. They often seem perfectly fine unless they are chewing on hard things or opening their mouth wide, or until it becomes very severe.

 

I would try to open his mouth at home. If he screams, I would go to your vet and tell them you think he has a retrobulbar abcess or inflamation. Meds can sually take care of this, however sometimes the area needs to be punctured an a culture taken so you know what antibiotics to use first. Some doctors want to do this as a firts step. Others will try antibiotics first.

 

Good luck to you and Fintan!

[Sorcha]

MYSTERY SOLVED

 

 

So, after early 5 hours at the e-vet, 6 x-rays and $600 the only thing that could be determined was that Fintan's stomach was distended with "amorphous granular material and gas" and no intestinal obstruction, no evidence of bloat. The simple answer was that Fin had more food than was expected in his stomach. Tonight about 1/2 hour after dinner, I put Fin and Nola in the backyard and went back inside for a few minutes to do dishes. I returned outside, called for them, and neither came which is highly unusual. I took a flashlight to search the dark areas of the yard and there, behind the Burning Bush, I found them gorging on something. I chased them away from the area, shined my flashlight on the ground and found a pile of food, mostly potatoes and something else that looked like a soup of vegetables in a white sauce. It had been dumped over the fence, right at the fence line with a neighbor, into my yard. The same neighbor who had tossed rotten tomatoes into my yard all summer, which Fintan found and ate if I did not find them first. I went over to talk to said neighbor, an elderly widower who is hard of hearing. I explained there was what appeared to be leftovers of dinner tossed over the fence onto my property. No, he said, I did not toss that food over the fence. Yes, I had my dinner (but he would not tell me what). I told him about the trip to the vet and the expense, that got his attention to the seriousness of the matter. However, he still did not admit it. There is no other way that food got into my yard. I picked up some of it as evidence, not sure why but felt I should, then threw down buckets of water to wash away the rest, then covered the whole area in straw.

 

 

Who knows what he tossed over the fence last night.

[quarrystepper]

How gratifying to have the mystery solved, but what a jerk your neighbor is being! I can't imagine how frustrating it must be, having him seemingly lie to your face. I bet it stops now, though, since you've mentioned how much the e-vet bill cost.

 

We have neighbors on one side who have been tremendously rude since we moved in. When we built our fence (the last step before we could adopt Brooks), they actually approached the builders and threatened them with a lawsuit if they stepped one foot over the property line. I'm very pleased that we never had an issue with them related to the hounds. We usually start our walks in the other direction so they have empty bladder/bowels by the time we pass their house on the last leg.

[3greytjoys]

You are smart to keep that evidence (and a picture of the ground scene outside). Hopefully, your neighbor is just a harmless non-animal savvy person. I know you are aware that some people do things intentionally to harm dogs. I know someone who lost four dogs (within 4 hours) from something someone tossed over the fence to harm them. (The dogs were mostly indoors but had a dog door into the back yard.)

 

Hopefully, your dogs are quiet when outside, and the yard is kept clean of feces and urine odor so that neighbor wouldn't have any reason to be upset with them. If interested, reflective ID collars increase visibility of our dogs while we're watching them during yard outings. If you end up questioning whether or not that neighbor will stop his behavior, one idea is to temporarily section off a dog potty area closer to your house, or on a different side from that neighbor.

 

What a relief that Fintan is okay after that scary situation while you were away. Hopefully, your mention of the expensive vet bill will be enough to stop your neighbor. Good luck.

 

 

To Skirtinthedirt: Welcome to GT and thank you for posting! That's excellent information for us to remember. We hope you'll post more on GT.

Edited November 11, 2013 by 3greytjoys

[tbhounds]

My neighbor did the same thing years ago-dumped her "cabbage water" over the fence into my backyard--the difference here is I saw her do it! After a few words of exchange and a threat of a lawsuit it never happened again. To this day I'm not sure why she thought it easier to truck across her entire backyard with a heavy pot to toss it over the fence rather than just pour it down her drain. Weirdo.

[Charlies_Dad]

This is why I have no neighbours . I would not tolerate that but am glad you found the cause.