It's Been One Heck of a Week w/ Sadie

Once we got back from vacation (I promise more on spring break coming soon), we started Sadie on a new medication to really target her osteoarthritis. I thought this might be the magic pill that was going to really help her. I'm still looking for something, anything that will make life a bit easier for our girl. 

Her bed at night

Alas, it wasn't the magic pill. Not even two days after starting the new medication, Sadie experienced a really bad side effect. Namely really bad diarrhea. Just imagine a dog who weighs 100 pounds and can't get up having diarrhea. Our house smelled. She smelled. It was a really long 6-7 days. The anti-diarrhea medication I ordered from Amazon (two different kinds) was not even making her feel better. My back hurt from trying to quickly get her up and down our front steps. I was exhausted. Tom was exhausted. Our kids complained about the smell, and Tom and I were really tired of bathing her, cleaning her and cleaning up after her many, many times a day. 

So on Monday (yesterday), I called the vet and they wanted to see Sadie. She did have some type of bacterial infection. And, because she couldn't hold anything down, she also lost 9 pounds. Good for her knees! They sent us home with a probiotic, some antibiotics and another two gel-filled syringes with some really foul smelling medicine. Miraculously, within 12 hours, she was feeling better and more like herself. 

We had to completely stop all her other medications so she hasn't been on those for almost a week which means no pain medications or steroids for her inflammation and pain but we needed to get her gut under control. It will be a bland diet of chicken and a starch (likely bread since she turned her nose up at white rice, potato and oatmeal) for a few more days before resuming her normal food and medications. 

I'm just glad she's feeling better and reminding myself that all of her problems wouldn't be so tough to handle if she wasn't a giant dog! 

Her favorite place - under my desk