HealthTag Archives

Well… Lucy wasn’t doing too well today, either. She wasn’t really regurgitating much, but she was being very weak in the rear. I have been saying for a few weeks now that her rear just looks weak, like she’s wobbly in the back end. So today she was falling over and my husband was nervous so took her back in.

The vet wasn’t too concerned about the weakness, thinking maybe it was leftover from the sedative yesterday. But they wanted to confirm the Megaesophagus, and so they gave her barium and they did some x-rays to determine what was going on.

Our collie girl is brave and she loves to eat so she swallowed it right down. The x-rays showed food stuck in her esophagus, all the way down to her stomach. Ack! So that told the vet she has Mega-E. Dang, Canine Megaesophagus is too hard to type every time so I’m going to abbreviate.

Mega means an enlarged esophagus… so her esophagus was full and enlarged, but the bottom, where her stomach is, is small and the food can’t pass through into her stomach if she gets clogged. The kinda funny thing about this is that my husband had the exact same thing! He had a balloon put down his throat and expanded so as to make his esophagus bigger. The vet wants to do the same thing to Lucy next week. And while they are there, get a tissue sample to see if maybe she does have cancer.

This could be caused by cancer or by gastrointestinal problems. Another tough word to spell, lol. Anyway, time for me to get home from work. But at least this is something. We have to feed her small portions of wet food and keep her upright for a while so hopefully it goes down. We will do all we can for our sweet Lucy smooth blue collie girl!

Well, the vet did an ultrasound today, and from that they have determined there is no blockage. Ugh! Would they see something for sure? Even if it’s maybe tape or invisible? My husband took her, and dropped her off, and talked to them.

So if there is no blockage, their next guess is it could be Canine Mesaesophagus. Here is some information from their website:

Regurgitation? Not Vomiting?
Regurgitation may be the first sign you notice. Either food or water, sometimes both, may be regurgitated. Regurge is a “passive” act -the stomach muscles typically do not contract or heave. The food brought up by regurgitation is usually undigested, may have a tubular shape, and is often covered with a slimy mucous. He/she will often try to eat the regurgitated material.

And it is true.. she doesn’t do the hacking thing where your stomach contracts and then you vomit. It’s more like she’s just laying there and suddenly, even peacefully, food and water come back up. So she does seem like she is regurgitating more than she is throwing up… aka vomiting.

Lucy is a collie, and she turned 9 years old in February, I wonder if this is common or uncommon in collies. I’ll have to check about that. There’s a yahoo group about this too, which I have joined.

Well, now I get to read more about it… and I have obedience lessons tonight. I hate that Lucy is regurgitating like this… and I guess I need to call it that, not vomiting. I didn’t actually even know there was a difference. My sweet Lucy. They also say, on the website, “Sleep deprivation due to night-time regurges is fairly common”… I have been putting her out of the bedroom at night, and feeling awful about it, or I couldn’t sleep. And I think she’s hungry and thirsty, too. She’s lost three pounds since her last vet visit which was probably early last week.

I hate this. I feel angry and helpless… like I did when Kip was old and his life was ending. I want to run and avoid and even get mad at Lucy… but I’m not mad at her, I’m mad at the bum body she got stuck with. Ugh.

Lately Lucy has been having some problems. We don’t think she has cancer…. well, the vet doesn’t think so, anyway. Which is good. She probably has calcification of the lungs. Which, really, shouldn’t affect her life.

But the last week or so she has been eating and drinking, and then throwing it right back up. Not all of it… some stays down, or she eats it again, as dogs will do. And she has been pooping, though it’s been very small.

We took her to the vet last week and they think she could have a partial blockage. That girl will eat anything, dangit. But if it’s partial, then some food is getting through, and she’s not loosing a lot of weight so that’s good. We had xrays done, and they couldn’t see anything. But last night after giving her a little kibble (she’s been on white rice and canned for a few days) she had a bad bout of hacking stuff up again. And it’s so hard for me to sleep when she is throwing up! I feel bad putting her out of the bedroom, but I don’t know what else to do and I feel so helpless I can’t help her in any way.

So my husband called the vet back and scheduled an ultrasound. So hopefully if there is something in there, they’ll find it, and be able to take it out.

My husband is running low on money, too, and he hasn’t been able to find a job yet. So this is not a good time financially for us for this to happen. But we’ll work it out. I do wish I could put the dogs on my health insurance!