Older dog issue

I had a very frightening thing happen with my sweet Willow last week.  She will be 15 years old in a few weeks.  When we got up Tuesday morning I thought she had had a stroke.  Her head was tilted to one side, her eyes were moving back and forth, she was falling down and when she could stay on her feet she was walking in circles.  She could not be still.  She would not eat..not at all like my Willow how always wants to eat.

I thought it was time to say good bye.  It was 5 AM and I took her back up to bed and cuddled her up and told her how much I loved her and how much I have valued everyday with her.  I cried and tried to keep her calm.

It turns out that what was happening is a issue call Vestibular disorder.  It is an inner ear issue that happens with older dogs.  No one quite sure why it happens.  The head is tilted, the eyes move, they fall down or just can not get up at all and when they can walk they tend to walk in circles.  I wanted to share this because it looks so horrible and many times dogs are put down that need not be.  Most of the time they fully recover within a couple of weeks with some TLC and time.  The head tilt may not go away.

If you have an on older dog (or cat) in your family, please read up on this.  The last day, weeks, months or years with our old pals are so special that if I can help one dog by posting this I am delighted.

Here’s to many years with all of our furfriends!

Blessings,  Barbara

This entry was posted on Sunday, April 12th, 2009 at 11:08 pm and is filed under Dog Info. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.