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- Apr 12, 2007
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I know I haven't been around all that much lately, but I would greatly appreciate any insight or experiences you've had that could help Inky and I out.
Inky is an obese, 14 year old DSH (for those who don't remember us). This past week or so I noticed that Inky wasn't eating well and took him into the vets on Saturday where he was diagnosed with fatty liver disease. He came home yesterday with instructions to force feed him (trying to get 1/4 of a can in him a day) and he is on 4 different pills (2 antibiotics, 1 nutritional supplement, and 1 appetite stimulant).
My vet let me know that it wouldn't be a quick turn around and that within a few weeks if he wasn't improving that it would be time to "think about what's best for Inky" (aka put him to sleep), however right now it seems as though the time to help him across the bridge might be now. My vet made it sound like his liver has shut down and that food will help to kind of jumpstart it and get it working again.
Right now I can't feed him more than about 3 dime sized, 1 inch thick balls of food at a time or he vomits it right back up, so I've been trying to feed him every 2 hours when I am up, to me this doesn't seem as though it could sustain him at all, but more like keep him alive while he's starving. He has went to the bathroom 3 times since coming home yesterday and all 3 times it was an olive green mess, he's not trying to cover it in his litterbox and he's not trying to clean it off of himself (though he is cleaning his paws where the IV was). He will still come to snuggle with me and he's purring, but he isn't lifting up his back end when I pet him like he usually does. He's been spending most of his time against the heater (I turned up the heat for him) and hunched up. He is still extremely jaundiced and he's wobbling when he walks (he lost a lot of muscle mass on his back legs).
I don't know if this is normal when recovering from the disease, or if it sounds more like the ending stages of it?
If anyone has any experience or suggestions, I would appreciate it more than anything, I am sitting on the fence as to whether to keep fighting or to make the appointment to let him go
Thank you,
Lauren and Inky
Inky is an obese, 14 year old DSH (for those who don't remember us). This past week or so I noticed that Inky wasn't eating well and took him into the vets on Saturday where he was diagnosed with fatty liver disease. He came home yesterday with instructions to force feed him (trying to get 1/4 of a can in him a day) and he is on 4 different pills (2 antibiotics, 1 nutritional supplement, and 1 appetite stimulant).
My vet let me know that it wouldn't be a quick turn around and that within a few weeks if he wasn't improving that it would be time to "think about what's best for Inky" (aka put him to sleep), however right now it seems as though the time to help him across the bridge might be now. My vet made it sound like his liver has shut down and that food will help to kind of jumpstart it and get it working again.
Right now I can't feed him more than about 3 dime sized, 1 inch thick balls of food at a time or he vomits it right back up, so I've been trying to feed him every 2 hours when I am up, to me this doesn't seem as though it could sustain him at all, but more like keep him alive while he's starving. He has went to the bathroom 3 times since coming home yesterday and all 3 times it was an olive green mess, he's not trying to cover it in his litterbox and he's not trying to clean it off of himself (though he is cleaning his paws where the IV was). He will still come to snuggle with me and he's purring, but he isn't lifting up his back end when I pet him like he usually does. He's been spending most of his time against the heater (I turned up the heat for him) and hunched up. He is still extremely jaundiced and he's wobbling when he walks (he lost a lot of muscle mass on his back legs).
I don't know if this is normal when recovering from the disease, or if it sounds more like the ending stages of it?
If anyone has any experience or suggestions, I would appreciate it more than anything, I am sitting on the fence as to whether to keep fighting or to make the appointment to let him go
Thank you,
Lauren and Inky