Tuesday, October 11, 2011

beagle pain syndrome? what the...?!?!

Baby McG
Baby V is doing well. He has nearly doubled in weight over the past month and a half and is getting so chunky. I LOVE his little rolls. :-) Also, he is sleeping slightly longer in the night. I still have to get up to feed him in the middle of the night, but he has been really good lately and has been going straight back to sleep right after. And I know that will keep getting better. I just have to stick with it and be patient...and strong.

Papa McG
Joe is doing well (as far as I can see, at least). :-) He is a great father. I know, like me, he has countless lessons to learn...but he is great with V and he smiles every time Joe is near him. That little boy loves his daddy so much already.

Mama McG
Read the last post. Oh yeah...and also...I HATE that I have to go back to work. HATE IT!! Like I've said before, I actually do like my job. But nothing would make me happier than to be able to stay at home with V every day and help him grow.

Lucy McG
Lucy just turned 4 this past week...already!! And she is a great big sister to V and I can tell that they will be the GREATEST of friends. But she has had another health hiccup this week. :-(

Remember last winter when Lucy was diagnosed with hip dysplasia?

(Click HERE for a refresher)

Well, she ended up responding well to the initial treatment of it and has been asymptomatic since then. Until now. Just over this past weekend she has started to whimper when moving and shrieks in pain if her hips are touched. So while I stayed at home with the baby on Sunday, Joe took her to the vet to see what they could do for the flare up of her hip dysplasia.

Only...

They took more x-rays and the radiologist on Sunday said there was no hip dysplasia.

WHAT the @#$%?????

Yeah.

That was my reaction verbatim.

So they did some blood work to see if it's possibly valley fever (hope NOT!), and if that comes back negative then they think she might have something called Beagle Pain Syndrome.

Not kidding.

Apparently Beagle Pain Syndrome is a type of meningitis that causes pain with movement, anorexia, depression, hunched posture, and guarding of the neck and genital area. It can, apparently, affect dogs other than beagles, too. It's treatable with steroids.

But here's my "thing":

If they originally diagnosed hip dysplasia and that initial treatment worked and got rid of all symptoms for almost a year, why are they now saying that it's something completely different? What I want to know is why in the WORLD one x-ray would show hip dysplasia and then one year later another shows that it's magically gone. Sorry, people...but hip dysplasia doesn't work that way. It actually gets WORSE over time.

Right now, they are hoping to rule out valley fever and we are just waiting for the results. If it's negative, then they are thinking it's the Beagle Pain Syndrome. But what if they are wrong about this, too? Or maybe they weren't wrong and she really DOES have hip dysplasia.

See? Confusing!!

Now I'm just skeptical about everything.

We have a follow up appointment later this week, so stay tuned for some news. Until then, though, just keep her little painful beagle butt in your thoughts and prayers.

1 comment:

Deborah said...

Just read your blog about your Lucy. My beagle Lucy may have Beagle Pain Syndrome also. She is almost 2 and this is her 2nd bout with it. Prednisone seems to help. I skipped her dose this morning and she's back to trembling and shaking. Hope things are going well with your Lucy. She looks a lot like our last beagle, Mandy!

Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...