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He's not been truly right for awhile now. Mostly on and off lack of enthusiasm with eating, smallish and hard downloads, lethargy that comes and goes. He otherwise acts normally, but goes through these bothersome periods of meh.
He went into boarding with constipation and came home with it still going strong. Dr. B told us to give him probiotics every other day for two weeks upon his return home, which helped a bit, along with mixing his grain free kibble with a bit of science diet regular kibble to see if that didn't help get things moving along in the downloads department. It did--sorta...
Lars got done with the probiotics about a week ago now. Potty problems returned, le sigh. Weird lack of appetite returned, albeit intermittently and inconsistently--eating 3/4 of his breakfast, but then eating everything for dinner for a few days in a row. Was really clingy yesterday, but I attributed it to his realizing that Ulysses was in the house. Then last night he struggled to finish his dinner; he did, but with lots of coaxing. After dinner settled, I gave him an inch strip of Petro Malt in the hopes it would produce some download results as he'd not produced one in a day or so; he gobbled it right down.
Woke this AM to a goodly sized download in the hallway box from him, but his breakfast eating performance was very lackluster. Didn't finish his wet food, which is like The Holy Grail to him, and only ate about half of his grain free only kibble. Time to go to the vet. Got an 1115 appointment.
Dr. B gave him the good looksee. Said there was probably still about 4-5 inches of stool left in his lower intestine/colon, but it wasn't hard or impacted just yet. Everything checked out fine physically. He asked a lot of questions about downloads--how often, consistency, etc. Told him how the Petro Malt really helped things move along, much better than the Lactulose ever did.
Dr. B thinks there's something chronically off with something in Lars' gut--be it narrowing of upper or lower intestine/slow gut motility/pancreas issues/chronic consitpation. Too many variables to consider. Told us to give Lars at least an inch strip of Petro Malt for the next seven days and to save Lars' downloads in baggies so Dr. B can examine them for any blood, check their consistency, etc. He wants to do a specialized blood draw related to pancreas function and also an ultrasound of Lars' abdomen. Our appointment for both is on Friday morning at 0945. Dr. B may also want to do a barium series of x-rays to check Lars' gut motility, but we don't know when that will happen.
We're pretty worried about our boy right now. He's Just Not Right, and he's too young at 5 1/2 to Not Be Right. I know we'll get it figured out, but...yeah...want answers now!
He went into boarding with constipation and came home with it still going strong. Dr. B told us to give him probiotics every other day for two weeks upon his return home, which helped a bit, along with mixing his grain free kibble with a bit of science diet regular kibble to see if that didn't help get things moving along in the downloads department. It did--sorta...
Lars got done with the probiotics about a week ago now. Potty problems returned, le sigh. Weird lack of appetite returned, albeit intermittently and inconsistently--eating 3/4 of his breakfast, but then eating everything for dinner for a few days in a row. Was really clingy yesterday, but I attributed it to his realizing that Ulysses was in the house. Then last night he struggled to finish his dinner; he did, but with lots of coaxing. After dinner settled, I gave him an inch strip of Petro Malt in the hopes it would produce some download results as he'd not produced one in a day or so; he gobbled it right down.
Woke this AM to a goodly sized download in the hallway box from him, but his breakfast eating performance was very lackluster. Didn't finish his wet food, which is like The Holy Grail to him, and only ate about half of his grain free only kibble. Time to go to the vet. Got an 1115 appointment.
Dr. B gave him the good looksee. Said there was probably still about 4-5 inches of stool left in his lower intestine/colon, but it wasn't hard or impacted just yet. Everything checked out fine physically. He asked a lot of questions about downloads--how often, consistency, etc. Told him how the Petro Malt really helped things move along, much better than the Lactulose ever did.
Dr. B thinks there's something chronically off with something in Lars' gut--be it narrowing of upper or lower intestine/slow gut motility/pancreas issues/chronic consitpation. Too many variables to consider. Told us to give Lars at least an inch strip of Petro Malt for the next seven days and to save Lars' downloads in baggies so Dr. B can examine them for any blood, check their consistency, etc. He wants to do a specialized blood draw related to pancreas function and also an ultrasound of Lars' abdomen. Our appointment for both is on Friday morning at 0945. Dr. B may also want to do a barium series of x-rays to check Lars' gut motility, but we don't know when that will happen.
We're pretty worried about our boy right now. He's Just Not Right, and he's too young at 5 1/2 to Not Be Right. I know we'll get it figured out, but...yeah...want answers now!
