Thank you for taking the time to read what I am sure will be a lengthy post by the time I'm done writing this!
Our 7 yr old male dog Teko is sick. His only real physical symptom right now is lymph node swelling in most outer glands (problems breathing/swallowing because the ones in his neck are swollen horridly). We haven't had him tested yet but are booking him in this week as we know we have to rule out Lymphoma. My problem is that I'm not convinced it's cancer. I know he is sick, but he isn't "sickly". For all of his outer lymph nodes to be effected, he would have to be stage III or further and he doesn't seem sick enough to be. He still gets excited, he still runs through the house, he still gets excited for food, catches his treats, essentially, he's still himself with some breathing problems. So, let me further this belief with what we've been going through since February of this year:
February 2011:
Teko's eyes are red and watery. We don't think much of it as his eyes get that way when he's stressed out. Fast forward a few weeks and he starts getting barky-er like he is barking at ever single possible noise he hears. I mention to my husband that I think his vision might be going if his other senses are kicking in like that. But his eyes got really red and started dripping green goop. So into the vet he goes. He was diagnosed with eye infection and given Prednisone eye drops and an eye antibiotic gel. Fast forward not even a week later and my husband takes Teko out for a drive. They get home and they go to come through the front door with the concrete stairs, and Teko walks right into the stairs, basically falls into them, and then starts freaking. We had to guide him in. He was completely blind. Rushed him to the vets and they said it was some form of systemic infection and prescribed oral Prednisone in lower doses. 4 days in and he had his vision again, but it didn't last. We had him into the vets 2 more times from him just instantly losing his sight. (It’s important to mention that before all of this we had his blood work done because he was 40lbs overweight and diets were not helping. He was diagnosed with hypothyroidism and started the meds 2 days before his eye sight went.)
March 2011:
I went insane researching his symptoms and how he looked. His eyes were red and bulging, but not like they were going to pop out of his head. His corneas were clouded (we thought glaucoma at first) and the vet said she seen floaters when his eyes started to clear up. I finally found a blog about another dog who looked like and experienced everything we were going through with Teko. The owner had taken the dog to every specialist under the sun and had a diagnosis of polymyositis. There was no way we could afford all the testing at that time. We contacted the vet with the information we found and she hummed and hawed and did that thing that vets and doctors do when you do your own research. Anyways, we had Teko on 50mg of Prednisone a day and kept him on that for almost 4 weeks, then very slowly weaned him off of the stuff.
May 2011:
Teko’s last prednisone pill was given this month. Eyes were still clear. But his front right elbow is swollen so big he can barely walk. We go back to the vet more than twice for that leg. Once it was infected and we had him on heavy duty antibiotics that helped the infection, but did nothing for the swelling or open sores. Another time we went in, they had no idea what was causing it, but it wasn’t visually infected. They sent us home with more antibiotics. We stopped them 3 days in because he ended up so sick from them he had diarrhoea and we just couldn’t get them into him anymore. He fought us so hard. So we just stopped. His leg would stay like this for the rest of this month and most of next.
July 2011:
His leg hadn’t healed, his skin was getting so much worse (flaky, dry) he just wasn’t doing good. On the suspicion that he has wheat allergies I searched out my different options. I found something that I never would have considered in my life prior to doing extensive research. All 3 of our dogs were switched to a Whole Prey Raw Food diet. Within less than a week his skin was perfect, his fur that was completely gone with the thyroid problems was coming in soft and smooth and thicker than before. His sores had healed themselves, his leg was pretty much back to normal. We had our puppy back! Also, new symptom (though we assumed it had more to do with him losing 40lbs since the thyroid meds) he started snoring.
August 2011:
The snoring kept up and we just got used to it, until 2 weeks ago when it got scary. He wasn’t sleeping properly because he was seemingly choking when he fell asleep. We felt so awful for him. We had an appointment for him this following Saturday. The Tuesday prior is when I noticed his lymph nodes in his neck were swollen pretty badly. Started researching that, and didn’t like that his symptoms sounded like lymphoma. We so aren’t ready to lose him! Given the information on lymphoma, I started checking his other lymph nodes and noticed that only the other lymph nodes on the side of him where his leg was swollen are enlarged –neck, groin, armpit, knee (except under his jaw, those are enlarged all the way around). His eyes were reddish again, and were leaking fluid, again. His ears were full of pus on Friday. I took video of that. But I wrapped his head/neck in warm towels 4 times before the vet appointment and his whole face was waxy like his ears were draining, and by the time the vet seen him, his ears looked perfect to her. The vet felt him and said that it’s more than likely Lymphoma. She can’t do the testing, we were referred to other hospitals/universities that could. So, in the meantime, we are researching to give us hope. There are so many odd diseases/viruses/infections that mimic Lymphoma that I feel bad for people who can’t afford the tests and just euthanize to save their pet the pain of having cancer. So very sad. Anyhow, back to Teko. Just wanted to mention that we had been fighting “Cannon Butt” where it wasn’t quite diarrhoea but just loose mud like stools for a while. Only a few times on the raw diet did he end up with normal BMs again. But, there is one week in particular that we seen him doing great , then it was like his immune system was compromised by something because that week we ended up with Cannon Butt again, his started scratching and nipping at his elbows (that were healed previously), and his eyes started to get red/watery again. I assumed that what dropped his immune system was that he got table scraps that week. Breads specifically (the possible wheat allergy I mentioned earlier). But it’s gone downhill since then.
We live in Ontario and specifically, we live in the Niagara Region. Not a hot spot for blastomycosis, I know. But, most houses here sit on damp, swamp like properties. Ours was almost a pond at any given time. Our dogs use the back yard to do their business, and quite often lay out there in the same back yard. Also, in and around this time, my husband started digging a hole from one end of our yard to the other to (eventually) house drainage tubes. But, there were times where said hole was full of water until it was drained. Also, we caught just our male drinking the water sometime as well. So it isn’t a far stretch that it could be some sort of bacterial infection, rather than something like Lymphoma. If fact, my husband pointed out that Teko has been sick (ear infections etc) since we first moved here. But whether or not it’s blastomycosis is another story. We seem to cover every symptom but the coughing. Although, when our son was an infant, he had bronchiolitis from RSV and we learned (the hard way) that skin being pulled up under the rib cage or around the clavicles was a sign that the lungs aren’t functioning properly. Teko’s mouth, as silly as it sounds, if he keeps it closed while breathing, the skin draws inward which it has never done. So it’s possible there is lung involvement? I’m possibly just grasping right now. But either way, he’s on 50mg of Prednisone to bring the swelling down in the lymph nodes, which has barely worked. Just enough to make him comfortable again. But, if it is Lymphoma, the Prednisone used for more than 7 days can make the chemo ineffective. So we’re grasping until the testing. To take him off of the Prednisone now without something to put him on that may work, means we’re putting him in the position of not sleeping/eating/breathing again.
Any advice that others who are more experienced would be appreciated before I go running to the vet with another magical possible diagnosis.
Thank you so much for your time reading this and responding!
Crystal (and Teko!)
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Topic: Saving my baby... (Read 1269 times)