Lily - My English Setter

[farrwf]

Great report on the surgery aftercare! ... Lily is a very pretty pup!!!

[Judi]

excellent news! your back yard looks so nice too!

[momofdecker]

Another great update - Keep up the good work!

[MikeMurphy]

Bobby, Bill, Judi, Holli ... Thanks for the comments. It got me thinking how much Lily has improved since last December and how well diabetes can be managed once any concurrent health issues are identified and resolved.

In Lily's case hypothyroidism was causing her to be insulin resistant for five months. She was in such bad shape last December that my wife and I were starting to lose hope. That all changed once we took her to the IMS, who identified her thyroid problem and convinced us to "give her a chance".

Now we can concentrate on regulating her diabetes with the proper balance of diet, insulin and exercise.

Last December ... "rat tail" and struggling to step up


Now ...

[Charlie's mom]

She is SUCH a pretty girl!

[momofdecker]

Bless your IMS for asking your family to 'give her a chance'.

My neighbor asked me a few weeks back if I knew of anyone looking for a pure bred lab puppy as they we considering trying to re-home their pup. Her name is Daisy and she is 10 months, only a couple of weeks older than our Toby pup. She described Daisy as being skittish and too rough for their older golden dog.

I offered for her to bring her over to meet Toby to try to socialize her. I put Toby in my father in laws yard (right next door) so she could have time to sniff around our yard alone. Daisy was so fearful she could not even bring her in my front gate. She had to take her to the back. She hid behind her owner and snarled at me. I leashed Kinser and brought him out first. She snapped at him. I put him back in the house. She wouldn't go near the fence line to see Toby and Rocky. After about 20 min. I leashed Toby and brought him over. She continued to hide behind her owner. I ran Toby around the yard on his leash. She looked a bit interested but we left her alone. Toby and I ran around some more and she finally dropped her front paws and the butt went up in the air. We let them sniff. She was still scared but showed signs of wanting to play. So I unleashed Toby and they did a few laps chasing each other around the yard. Then she was beat and hid behind her owner again. Was back to being nervous if Toby went near her so I leashed him again.

When I looked at her I noticed her belly fur from her spay was not grown in. She was spayed in march. She was foaming at the mouth. A two minute romp around the yard tired out a 10 month old lab pup. She was fearful and reactive. I started asking questions. Found that she was spayed at her regular vet, which is closer to the Syracuse area. But she was vaccinated locally, at the same animal hospital Decker's original vet owns. She had to carry all 65 pounds of Daisy into the vets because she was so fearful. She asked the vet about the lack of fur re-growth from the spay and was told not to worry about it. She was told try taking her to Petco, etc... to socialize her. Can you imagine - taking a snarling and snapping (fearful and reactive) pup to a place with children who might want to pet a puppy? Thankfully my neighbor didn't feel that was a good idea either.

I recommended she take her back to her normal vet for a second opinion. I recommended she have some blood work run and to ask the vet about the possibility of her having an unbalanced thyroid. She's very young and it would be unlikely, but not impossible.

That first picture of Lily reminds me sooo much of how Decker looked before his hypothyroidism was diagnosed. I think his initial mobility challenges were a result of the low thyroid levels and that when he lost his vision and became so lethargic and fell so often that one of those falls caused his spinal compression injury.

She brought Daisy over a second time and she was able to bring her in the front gate. Daisy still won't let me pet her but she didn't snarl at me this time. She ran with Toby again for about two minutes and then was exhausted and foaming at the mouth again. She's going to try to bring her over once a week to see if there is any behavioral improvement. She made great progress from week one to week two so we are hoping week three is continued improvement. I still hope she takes her back to her original vet to ask some questions though. Having seen first hand the impact of having a low thyroid can have on the life of a dog - no question in my mind it's worth at least exploring the possibility.

I'm so glad you have 'only diabetes' to manage these days!

[peggy0]

She's such a beauty

[MikeMurphy]

Originally Posted by momofdecker

Bless your IMS for asking your family to 'give her a chance'.

My neighbor asked me a few weeks back if I knew of anyone looking for a pure bred lab puppy as they we considering trying to re-home their pup. Her name is Daisy and she is 10 months, only a couple of weeks older than our Toby pup. She described Daisy as being skittish and too rough for their older golden dog.

When I looked at her I noticed her belly fur from her spay was not grown in. She was spayed in march. She was foaming at the mouth. A two minute romp around the yard tired out a 10 month old lab pup. She was fearful and reactive. I started asking questions. Found that she was spayed at her regular vet, which is closer to the Syracuse area. But she was vaccinated locally, at the same animal hospital Decker's original vet owns. She had to carry all 65 pounds of Daisy into the vets because she was so fearful. She asked the vet about the lack of fur re-growth from the spay and was told not to worry about it. She was told try taking her to Petco, etc... to socialize her. Can you imagine - taking a snarling and snapping (fearful and reactive) pup to a place with children who might want to pet a puppy? Thankfully my neighbor didn't feel that was a good idea either.

I recommended she take her back to her normal vet for a second opinion. I recommended she have some blood work run and to ask the vet about the possibility of her having an unbalanced thyroid. She's very young and it would be unlikely, but not impossible.

I'm so glad you have 'only diabetes' to manage these days!

Holli... Your neighbor's Daisy sure displays a lot of the symptoms of a thyroid problem. I hope she follows through with the testing. I wouldn't want to wish hypothyroidism on her pup, but ... If that's what it is, the soloxine meds really do the trick and are so inexpensive.

On another note... I was Googling around last night and found a video of Lily when she was a wee pup still living at the breeder's house. Lily is the pup looking at herself in the window. She was named Violet at the time, but when we met her, we just knew she was more like a Lily.

http://youtu.be/UzpD6qEvDZ0

Also found a video of Lily's big brother Cowboy ...

http://youtu.be/X4Wtn-ugyHY

Mike

[MikeMurphy]

Hi everyone. Back for an update on Lily's BG levels.

A month ago, I started trying to figure out why Lily's fasting levels were so high and the rest of the day things looked pretty good. It appeared that she might be getting too much insulin. Reducing her insulin seemed to help for a few days, but then the high fasting levels came back.

This thread suggested to me that a high protein diet can cause high BG levels at fasting ...

http://www.k9diabetes.com/forum/showthread.php?t=5664

Originally Posted by amydunn19

When people start talking really high protein, ultra low carb diets for diabetics, I always feel the need to caution them to be prepared for those numbers to go up. I have noticed they tend to have really high fasting numbers. Too much up and down for me.

Originally Posted by peggy0

forbes was always on blue buffalo. i had to go from wilderness to weight control grain free. the protein hiked his numbers the grain free worked for him.

So, last week I switched her diet from Blue Buffalo Wilderness Healthy Weight (30% protein) to Blue Buffalo Freedom Grain-Free Healthy Weight (20% protein). I also started giving her a teaspoon of Benefiber with each meal.

Did a curve today and the numbers look very flat and no more sky high fasting numbers. I'm gonna increase her from 18 to 19 units and see if I can get her down to more acceptable numbers.

Any thoughts on this would be appreciated.

Here's last months curve on the high protein diet and 19 units...



And today's curve on the lower protein diet and 18 units...

[Monsters Momma]

Mike, I found Vinny's numbers on BBW were much higher, not just at fasting. When I thought we had given it a valiant effort, I decided to hit the reset button back to something I knew worked. My plan was, when we got his numbers under control again, to give the BB Freedom a try. Glad to see it has worked for you!

I guess we both have dogs that a little protein goes a long way with!
Mel