Ein's Weekend

In case you didn't know, Ein is the cutest!

He stole Molly's free plushie toy that she was awarded for being entered in last weekend's trial!

He stole Perri's, too!  (Not pictured - it was pink!)

Then we went on a little field trip to place a travel bug in one of my geocaches , hidden in my favorite local park.  It is my favorite park because it has a big field for dog walking and ball playing with a creek running through.  We visit once a week or more when the weather is warm!

Somebody was overjoyed to be out for a run without the other two annoying dogs tagging along.

The ball...all to himself!

So happy his ears disappeared!

Ein didn't do much fetch.  He seems to be content to just bring me the ball and have me take it and give it back to him so he can trot around with a ball in his mouth until the next time he wants to share it with me.

Ein was pretty sore after running around and I felt sad about it.  He was definitely doing too much sprinting, especially since there was a fair bit of snow left on the ground.  He is feeling a lot better now but he is still stiff in his rear end from overdoing it.  I feel a little guilty for not limiting more but then, I have to let him enjoy himself.  Where do you draw that line between protecting an older dog from the consequences of acting like a  young sound dog...or just letting him enjoy himself for a little while?  I am still trying to figure that out.

The Finest Einest

And our last trial day of the 3-Day Trial Weekend was all Ein's!  We left a little earlier than planned and hit up a geocache on our way.  It was in a cemetary way up on top of a hill overlooking the town that we live outside of.  Ein was overjoyed to stretch his legs off leash while I searched.

After making the drive and collecting a Salted Caramel Latte from Starbucks we headed to our club, DTCCC, for a double rally trial.  Our last of the year!  And really, it felt like our best.  Ein was absolutely shuddering with joy to get into the ring with me!  Our first run his nub was wagging so hard on the way into the ring and we flew through the course with a perfect 210.  The tail never stopped!  That run earned us our Rally Veterans Championship 3 title, First Place and also the Highest Scoring Veteran in the entire trial.  Yeah!  The next trial Ein earned another 208 and a first place again and might possibly have been even more overjoyed to get into the ring with me.  I wish I had it on video!

I was so grateful that Veterans was first in the second trial, because that left us enough time to return to Flexible Flyers and get Ein massaged and lasered by Next Level Canine Rehab and Fitness.  It has been a while since he has had a laser treatment, about 6 weeks, and just this morning I had noticed his left rear leg shaking while he stood still.  The news was not very awesome.   Ein was extremely tender and guarded in his left groin.  As soon as she touched him there, his head whipped up and he tensed.  It hurt there.  The right side was similar, but definitely not the same level of pain response as he had shown on the left.  "Active Rest" and some rimadyl are recommended.

This is all understandable.  Ein's rear end is truly a wreck.  Lately I had been mentally entertaining some very occasional agility trial runs (like, one per trial a few months apart.)  Pursuing an ARCHEX.  But after today's assessment, I will be far more conservative with Ein.  Nothing is worth taking away his every day life mobility and his soundness to take short walks or gentle hikes with me.  So, in Veterans class we will stay.  We are both very happy there.

We hit up some more geocaches on the way home.  One geocache was out at the bottom of a field and into the woods, about a tenth of a mile.  I could not resist bringing Ein with me.  I kept him leashed and he looked great on the walk down the hill.  I asked him to down-stay while I walked through some rougher footing in the woods to the cache and he was more than happy to comply.

But the walk back up the hill to the car, he looked more labored to me. Or maybe I am just paranoid.  But I scooped him up and carried him back up the hill.  I breathed in his fur smell, I always said he smells like an eraser.  One of those pink erasers.  Everybody made fun of me for saying that, but that is what his smell is to me and I love it.  I stopped to catch my breath and watched the sunset through the powerline towers and over the countryside and felt the flashback of every mile we ever hiked together.  Of my dog eating boulder fields for breakfast and racing ahead of me while I wheezed up a sharp incline.  For the first time, I didn't feel sad that I was carrying him and that things weren't what they used to be.  I just felt joy to be in this phase of our lives together.  We had an absolutely beautiful day with great friends, great scores and a nub-wagging fun time in the ring.  What more could we ask for?  Life changes and we change with it, and I had this amazing moment of gratitude to have my best red dog with me to enjoy a sunset on a chilly December evening with.  In my arms or racing up ahead of me, either way, we were together.  

When we got home I added his Highest Scoring Veteran ribbon to my favorites in my living room.  I am so proud of our beautiful year together.  

Ein: Increased Rear End Strengthening and Plans for the Future

Ein loves, and I mean loves, to play on his physical therapy equipment.   We have two peanuts, two balance discs and some paw pods.  Ein is wild about his peanut and just tonight I introduced wanting him to stand on the peanut with his front legs, and the balance disc with his rear legs.  This puts his weight on the rear legs, but also works the muscles there even more, because he has to maintain balance on the rear legs as well as having more weight shifted on to them.  

Ein tried to cheat!  He put his right rear leg onto the disc (his bad leg), but kept his strong rear leg off of it, so that he could off load his weight onto the "good" leg and still get his treats.  Nope, not fooling me.  We worked on this a little bit tonight, but it was really hard for him so we did not do a lot of duration.

We are doing a really cool class on the Fenzi Dog Sports Academy called K9 Conditioning taught by Debbie Gross and there are at least two Gold Level students whose dogs have hip dysplasia.  I am looking forwards to learning a lot from them!  The class is only two weeks in and I am really enjoying it.

I also made Ein an appointment for next Tuesday with our local vet to consult for cold laser therapy treatments.  I am very excited about this.  I have heard a lot of wonderful things about the cold laser for arthritic dogs and I am hoping that Ein can enjoy those benefits as well.  I will also have a blood test done to check on his liver, since for a while he was getting a daily rimadyl pill.  Since putting him on Dasuquin and taking him swimming more regularly and committing to these PT exercises, Ein has been able to go without the rimadyl many days.  I would still like to make sure that he is not experiencing any of Rimadyl's famous ill effects.  I would also like to possibly find a gentler alternative for when Ein does need pain medication.

I mean this with all of my heart: if somebody told me that Ein could live only six more months pain free on Rimadyl, or two years in pain without it, I would rather have less time with him.  Rimadyl terrifies me.  The thought of losing Ein terrifies me.  I am so bonded to him, so in love with him, I cannot imagine life without him.  But part of that love is giving him everything he needs to be comfortable and happy, even if that gives me less time with him.  It is not even a question.  What sense is it to let a dog live a half life, suffering and not enjoying what he loves, just so that I can have him still with me?  Selfishness.  If we can find a better medication that manages his pain as well as Rimadyl, I am game.  If not...I just want my dog to not hurt.  And if that means that I don't get to hold onto him for as long as possible then that is how it will be.   That is not what this relationship is about.

This got a little morbid and emotional!  I get this way about Ein.  Please enjoy a photo of him laying on his balance disc while I work on focus exercises with Perri.  Y'know.  Just hangin' out in case I want to play some more with him!  He is Simply the Best.

Real Dogs Exercise on Pink?

Say Goodbye to Old Dog Blues

On Saturday, Ein and I attended our annual Philly Area Corgi Group picnic.   The corgi picnic is one of the highlights of my year, every year.  There is the hot dog bobbing contest, there is the musical hoops contest, there is the silent auction of doggie and corgi items and there is lots of food and lots of corgis!  Ein and I never do the hot dog contest, because he has always been afraid to nose into the water for the hot dogs.  And the competition is stiff!  We have never stood a chance.  Musical hoops was always our game.  It is like musical chairs, except that everyone walks around a ring of hoops and when the music stops, you get your dog to sit in a hoop.   For Ein, who has always been good at heeling and sitting when I stop walking, this game was a cakewalk!  We have won it probably four times.

This year Ein had a hard time getting his rear end into the baby pool.  He woke up limping on his front leg and stiff in his rear, so I didn't think musical hoops was something that we should be doing.  All those years of going to our picnic and enjoying those two things above all else, and suddenly his hip dysplasia is sticking its ugly face in there, reminding me that my dog is not who he used to be.

I went back over to Ein's x-pen by myself and really felt like crying.  It might seem stupid to some.  But nine years of this dog, nine years of my little badass that nothing could stop.  My little scrapper who was picking fights with german shepherds at the dog park "just yesterday."  And suddenly he is old.  I am still learning how to deal with that.  My dog who could hike 12 miles over a boulder field is having trouble stepping into a baby pool.  Through some twist of fate my x-pen was next to a corgi and owner that I have seen coming to the picnic every year that I have been going.  Except this year, her dog's entire rear end was paralyzed because of degenerative myelopathy, a condition common in corgis.  He was her agility dog.  I have always noticed corgis on wheels, corgis in strollers, or corgis who were half lame at the picnic.  But not until this year, when my own dog is going lame, did I become hyper aware of what causes these wonderful dogs to be confined to a wheel cart or a stroller.

The end result was that while I enjoyed the picnic, it was a bittersweet day for me.  I enjoyed being my normal shutterbug self and taking 84 photos of all the picnic-goers (Click here to see the Flickr Album).  I enjoyed the food.  I enjoyed spending a day out with Ein.  But I allowed his mortality to make me feel sad.  I became worried that he may likely have degenerative myelopathy as well.  A friend of mine who recently lost her beloved doberman at only 7 years old to osteosarcoma told me that she regrets missing out on her dog's "old dog years."  That I will regret it if I continue to mourn Ein before he is even gone.  And she is right. 

I am busy with the girl dogs.  I'm going in a million directions.  I feel like I have no time for Ein.  But a lot of that has been because Ein's recent grouping of diagnoses makes me feel so sad that every time I look at him, it is all that I can think about.

No more.  It has to stop.

Another friend sent me an exercise peanut weeks ago.  I inflated it last night and we got to work and Ein had so much fun.  It is a new game, and it can be an every day thing.  So what if we are doing it to strengthen his wrecked hips.  He is having fun, and so I am having fun.

I must embrace this time.  I must enjoy it.  The last dog that I had pass away was 9 years old when he died.  He was fine one day and died overnight.  No warning, no old dog years.  He was just gone one morning when I woke up, he died in his sleep.  No exercise peanuts, no supplements, no cozy orthopedic dog beds and shorter walks.  He was just gone.  I haven't lost Ein to cancer, or a heart failure, or a tragic accident - I still have him.  He is still there and happy and he is still my boy, and just because his body is starting to deteriorate doesn't mean that we can't find new ways to enjoy our relationship.

Today I also went to Petsmart and bought him a lifejacket.  Swimming his fantastic exercise for the hips.  The dog is working his joints in the water, but there isn't any impact.  Ein has always loved swimming for his ball, but he tires easily and starts sinking into the water and coughing.  I have always chuckled a little over doggie life jackets.  My dogs can swim just fine, they don't need that stuff.   I used to think the same thing about training classes though, and look at me now.  When I watched my dog be able to swim out after his tennis balls for ... I don't even know how long, I lost track of time, I regretted not doing this sooner!   (In fact, I am probably going to get Perri a life jacket also.)

And if Ein can't be the musical hoops champion every year anymore, we are going to have to start training towards being the hot dog bobbing champions!  I think that he will be a fast learner.

Throw Back Thursday - Soccer Balls!

I was chatting with a fellow Team Unruly member about more than a few subjects - but one thing that came up was how I have said "screw this" about keeping Ein on light duty and have started throwing his tennis ball for him again.   It is nearly physically painful for me to do so much with the girldogs while he stands at my screen door and cries because he is being excluded.  The lion's share of Ein's attention these days is his PT exercises and being my chillin' out buddy while I read books or play with the ipad on my back porch.

Sometime last week he found one of Perri's squeaky tennis balls and threw it at me.   Enough of the sedentary life, woman!  Meanwhile, back to my chat with my friend.   She recently got a new job working for Best Friends Animal Society and said that one of the dogs there has some structural problems, so they let him play with a Boomer Ball rather than a tennis ball, since the dog is less inclined to do those abrupt stops and turns with larger ball.  She suggested maybe I might try something like that with Ein.  Yes!

It has been years since I have had a soccer ball for Ein, but he loves chasing them and biting them and pushing them around, and the good thing with that is that he won't be racing after a tennis ball and slamming the brakes on to grab it.   He might enjoy the ball chasing in the moment, but later on it could cause him to stiffen up.  (Does this mean we will never play tennis ball again?  Not at all.)  I will keep an eye out for a Boomer Ball or Ein-sized Jolly ball, but in the meantime I will pick up a cheapie soccer ball for him to enjoy.

And in honor of Throwback Thursday, Ein enjoying soccer balls in his youth...

And because if I say "Jolly Ball" in a post, I have to remind all exactly how much Molly loves her Jolly ball...

BANZAAAAAIIIII!

Puzzle Pieces

Finding out that Ein has hip dysplasia has been resulted in a cascade of thoughts to the effect of "So that's why..."  The hind end conditioning exercises that I have reviewed (and actually started working on in a conservative manner) are great.  Some of them have also resulted in these lightbulb moments.

Perch work.  I remember in a Rally class two autumns ago, all the other dogs were happy to just walk their forepaws up onto a raised dog bowl.  Just walk right up there.  I thought Ein was scared or anxious.  He would step around the bowl, he would walk towards me with his forepaws on either side.  He would not put his paws up there.  It is only recently that I have had any success with him, by using a frisbee - a much lower object - and even then, he doesn't like to stay on the frisbee.

Why?  Looking over these exercises, it specifically puts strain on the rear legs to do that very thing. (the "Paws Up" exercise.)  And the higher you go, the more strength is required out of the rear end of a dog.  Doing this probably caused Ein to not only focus on offering new behaviors and train, but it also probably hurt him - a little or a lot, the pain was there.

I have started this with Ein, using only a 326 page book.  I am keeping the duration short.  We will build up to longer, we will build up to higher - especially as the supplements help his body to feel better.

Sit-to-Stand (or Down-to-Stand).  The Stand command has been the bane of my rally existence with Ein.  It still is.  We actually NQ'd last September because he was stressed out and absolutely refused to come into a Stand.  In the Veterans course that we did at our most recent Rally trial, you could see in the video that he needed to be cued three times.  Ein has always been a reluctant Stand-er, to the point where I even changed his cue word to "Please" because I felt the cue was poisoned.

And another puzzle piece.  It hurts him!  To come up into a Stand (whether from a Down or a Sit) he has to power up his entire body using only his poorly put together rear end, with no help from his forelegs.  Not comfortable!  Pair that with anxiety from being at a trial - and the whole thing was probably completely overwhelming for him.

Foreleg Shaking has been something that I have been puzzled by with Ein for a long time.  I already mentioned this particular lightbulb moment but Wow!  Ein has been putting his weight on his front end for so long, I am sure it has caused a strain.  Thinking of how my hands may shake after I have been carrying something really heavy for a long time - that is what Ein has been going through.  I did mention this to more than one vet but it seemed to be more of a mystery for them than anything.

Old Photos.  There is nothing more heartbreaking to me about this whole thing than looking back at old photos and seeing Ein favoring that right rear leg.  And he has been.  And I never even noticed.  I am really sad that I have been so clueless - but in my defense, this little dog has been so active and tenacious that I never even thought to look for structural problems.  Shame on me.

The ground is just uneven here so I can see why he is standing this way - unrelated to his HD.  But I just really love this photo!

Another of the exercises that we have started working on is the "3 Legged Stand".  Ein does okay with having his right rear leg picked up, to the point where it seems like it's not really that difficult for him.  But it is a strain on him and I know this because when I pick up that left leg?  He has such a hard time putting his weight on the right rear.  It is really really sad, and even though he has his front end for support, he very nearly has to sit down - that right rear leg is so weak.  I don't do a lot of duration at all on this one.  We will keep working on it, though.  

I am glad that I now know that Ein has HD.  I know of a few people who think that their dog may have HD, but are reluctant to do the x-rays because there is nothing to be done anyway.  But I disagree with that.  From supplements, to strengthening exercises and treatments to give a dog comfort and quality of life - I think that there is a lot to be done.  I wish that I had known sooner, and perhaps we could have prevented the progression of the spondylosis.  Perhaps not.  But when it comes to HD, I feel like knowing for sure is absolutely the path that I want to be walking.  Knowing about Ein's HD is certainly helping me understand him even more deeply - it helps me understand that some of the things that Ein has been doing or refusing to do, were not entirely rooted in anxiety after all.

Moving Forward with Ein

I have been absolutely negligent about blogging lately.  So much has been going on!  I want to start by following up on what is going on with Ein's health.

I took Ein to visit a veterinary practice that is more specialized in musculoskeletal issues - a rehab vet.  I did not see the actual rehab vet herself, but I did see another vet at the practice who was very knowledgeable.  And that was what I wanted - someone who coul

He looked at Ein's x-rays.  He told me that Ein has arthritic elbows.  Good shoulders.  It goes without saying that the hips are a horror show of arthritis and dysplasia.  I had told him that I was an x-ray tech so he said, "And of course, with the spondylosis..."  Whoah.  Back that up.  Spondylosis?  I honestly had not noticed.

Without going all scientific, spondylosis is a condition of the spine where the vertebrae grow little bone spurs.  The body is trying to do a type of natural spinal fusion, and it is compensating for an instability in structure.  Which Ein certainly has.  As spondylosis progresses, it can pinch the nerves off and interrupt healthy nerve communication.  Functions such as bowel, bladder and rear leg control can be affected as spondylosis progresses.  Scary stuff.  The vet showed me how already Ein's response to having his rear legs "knuckled over" is very limited.  The vet bent Ein's toes into his fist and Ein just stood there and made no effort to put weight on his foot, pull it away or place it back on the floor.  Not great.

The vet and I discussed surgical options.  FHO or Femoral Head Ostectomy, where the femoral head is literally removed and the body creates its own joint - it takes the dysplastic hip and arthritic femoral head entirely out of the picture.   Total Hip Replacement, where Ein would get a new hip entirely.  But I am not interested in surgical options.  Ein is nine years old, it would be costly, and I think that we have plenty of other options on the table available for Ein to live very rich life without surgical correction.

We discussed how Ein has been putting a lot of his weight on the front, for a long time.  This explains why he has foreleg tremors.  We need to get Ein's pain under control and get him off that front end so much.  The vet explained that in time and with no intervention, Ein will likely become bowlegged due to the tremendous strain he will be putting on his elbows.  The muscles in Ein's hips/rear are atrophying.

We started Gabopentin and I was given a bottle of Rimadyl, both for pain.  The vet did mention Science Diet JD, a prescription diet formulated specifically for dogs with joint issues.  I am not a fan of science diet, though, and will not be feeding that to Ein.  The primary ingredient is corn, and Ein would be an itchy, hairy, flaky disaster if I went back to feeding him a corn based diet - no matter what the benefits to his bones.  We discussed glucosamine supplements, we discussed fish oil supplements (Both of those, I am already feeding to Ein.)

I was recommended to make an appointment with the actual rehab vet, which I have yet to do.  (though I was told that she had given Ein's x-rays a glance while the vet that we saw was doing so.)  Accupuncture, cold laser therapy, hydrotherapy.  We have a lot of options.

We learned nothing earth shattering, but I feel a whole lot more grounded.  I feel like I have a plan.  My dog's skeleton is poorly put together, and falling apart.  Nothing can change that.  Moving forward I would like to see the rehab vet, though she is hard to get an appointment with.  I have been faithful with his pain medication and his supplements (although he despises the fish oil capsules.)  When we get the pain under control I would like to start on some rear end strengthening exercises.  The foreleg limp persists and it absolutely crushes me.  I hate seeing this active little dog reduced to a couch potato and excluded from playing fetch and other fun activities (though, I think that I am bothered more than he is.)

We will be participating in a cool opportunity at the end of May, however.  I have recently been working a lot of overnight shifts at my job, and in May more than a few of those overnight shifts leave me with the day off on Friday (I'm supposed to be sleeping, but hey.)  Which has led to a bit of an irrational frenzy of entering AKC shows on those Fridays - oops.  I just can't help myself.  On a Friday at the end of May, there is an AKC trial that is offering "Glory Runs" on Friday only.

These Glory Runs benefit the entrant's choice of either the Golden Retriever Foundation, or the Morris Animal Foundation.  The run will consist of jumps (either with no jump bars or at the handler's choice of jump height), tunnels and a 4" high table at the end.  "This special event is designed to showcase and honor retired and/or disabled agility dogs..."   I am buying Ein an entry for this and I am really excited about it - it is so very timely.  I especially like that I have the option of running Ein through jump standards only, if I do not want him jumping even 4" - it will all depend on how he is feeling.  I feel like he can handle this, I feel like he can enjoy this.

A Nasty Surprise

I recently learned some pretty rotten news about Ein.  When his limp did not improve after a week of anti inflammatory meds, the vet decided that we should do some x-rays of his legs.  We x-rayed his shoulders and elbows and his hips and knees.  What we discovered shook me to my core.

Ein has terrible, terrible dysplasia in both hips.  He has probably had it his entire life.  The right hip is the worst, it is arthritic and the femoral head is not even sitting in the "joint" (probably because, there is no joint.)  The left hip is agonizingly arthritic and jagged.  I did a Google search for arthritic hip dysplasia.  I had a hard time finding a set of hips worse than Ein's hips.

The top hips are a set of healthy hips.  The bottom x-ray is Ein's x-ray.

How could this be?  He has been like this for a long, long time - and I had no idea.  It is hard not to feel guilty and as though I have been totally clueless and insensitive.  We have hiked literal hundreds of miles together over rocks, up steep mountains, into caves.  He has swam rivers, lakes, creeks.  He has probably clocked just as many hours chasing a ball, hard and fast as many border collies might.  I have always been so proud of his long legs, his reasonably fit little body, his muscles.  He has always kept up with the big dogs, and never batted an eye.  And in the past few years, he has been running agility and doing jumps on Rally-O courses.  He just keeps on going.

So, looking back, when Ein preferred to sleep under the desk instead of going hiking with me?  I can only guess he was in too much pain and just felt like taking a nap instead.  When the girldogs ran into him and hurt his right foreleg two weeks ago, he was out a third leg to support his weight on.  And that is what made me finally notice.  He truly hid the hip pain well.  Just in 2012 he did a total of 50 backpacking miles in two trips without batting an eye.

So where do we go from here?

I scratched his entry in the AKC Agility trial.  I scratched his RAE entry in the Rally-O trial.  He is and has been on strict rest.  I am restarting him on Glucosamine and I am going to be faithful about giving it to him.  Since I am dramatic, and neurotic, I feel like the dog my dog has always been has been taken from me.  Our fun and active life together is now over.  It said Goodbye and I was not listening.  What was the last great hike that we took?  It wasn't great enough to have been our last.

I am taking Ein to a Rehab Vet Hospital tomorrow to have his foreleg evaluated more thoroughly, and to form a plan regarding his hips.  I want to know our Options.  I want to do the best things for him, and I want to possibly see him be able to continue gentle hikes and to play some ball, and to be able to enjoy some of the things that were business as usual when he was younger.  I don't know if he will be able to play agility anymore.  I don't know about Rally-O (Besides Veterans class.)  At this point, I just want his foreleg to get better so that he has at least one set of legs that aren't falling apart (his forelegs have some arthritis, but nothing dramatic.)  I want us to just be able to go for walks together without him being in pain.  But mostly, I just want him to be comfortable and happy.

"Miles to go before I sleep..."