Heart Like a Dog

The Good, the Bad, and the Oh My God of living with dogs!

Treating Chronic UTI’s

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Beginning in December, we’ve been dealing with three major health issues with Delilah. Today I am going to share with you the first issue, Chronic UTI’s, and in future posts, I will share the others. I should let you know that Delilah is okay, we are just trying to get to the bottom of this rabbit hole we jumped into.

The day after Sampson’s *hem hem* morning surprise, he was scheduled for an acupuncture appointment at our vet’s office. I came home from work, and let Delilah out, and then I let her out again, and again.

My little UTI meter went ding, ding, ding, so I grabbed my handy Dog Urine collection kit, and grabbed a sample. While the vet prefers the first sample of the morning, it is absolutely possible to determine infection with a non-morning sample.

Because no-one should start the morning with dog pee on them.

As Sampson was having his session, the vet staff ran a check on Delilah’s urine, and sure enough, she had a UTI. It was her first one since July, when she had that really awful one with blood in her urine. I went home with a two week course of antibiotic, with instructions to check her a few days after she finished. I also went home with 100 mg of Gabapentin. (Just an FYI, Gabapentin works incredibly well in helping with that frequent urge to go, which so often accompanies a UTI.)

I had just enough time (so I thought) to take Delilah for a quick walk before I had to pick my sister up from the airport. I say, “so I thought,” because I forgot to account for the time it took the Gabapentin to work, and the frequency with which my dog had to stop to ‘pee’.

At every single house. Some of them twice!

Sometimes a girl just has to go.

Eventually we made it around the block and the Gabapentin kicked in.

The recommended dosage of Gabapentin for Delilah, was one or two every 12 hours. But I found at around the 9 hour mark, Delilah was again experiencing the urge to go.

I hatched a plan, that I got approved by my vet, and that was to give Delilah one Gabapentin every  8 hours. That did the trick for her, and kept her comfortable while the antibiotic did its job.

We gave Delilah the antibiotic as directed and checked her about four days after she finished the antibiotics, and she had a UTI. Grrr….

So began our four month struggle with UTI’s.

I’m not kidding, this poor dog was on an antibiotic for most of four full months. My vet would take the sample, check it, send it out to find out what antibiotic would work best for it. We would follow the instructions to the letter, and retest, and either she would STILL have the UTI, or it would be gone, but then she would have another one in a couple of days.

After doing this dance two or three times, my vet suggested Delilah be checked for bladder stones. I was also concerned about Cancer, but the Vet thought that was unlikely. So we scheduled an ultra-sound and she spent the day at the vet, and nothing showed up.

My vet’s next thought that the sphincter muscle between the bladder and the urethra was weak, she recommended stopping the Vetriscience Bladder Strength, which had worked amazingly well for almost two years, and switching her to a prescription estrogen. It was recommended the UTI be cleared up before we started the Incurin, but that proved to be close to impossible.

So, towards the end of one course of antibiotics, we switched her to Incurin. And the infections kept coming.

The next thought (by my vet) was that she had Cushing’s disease.

To which I emphatically said, “She does not present as a Cushings dog.”

Finally, at my wits end with traditional medicine, I called the Holistic Vet.

Since I just started a new job, I didn’t have the time to take off to drive her to his office, which is over an hour away. Luckily for me, he knows the dogs, and agreed to consult with us electronically. I forwarded all Delilah’s records to his office.

We started with records from June of 2016 because that was her annual check-up, and with the exception of the slightly elevated liver levels, she was in good health.

Dr. Landau put her on a Chinese Herb called, “Bu Zhong Yi Qi Tang,” which is designed to help her immune system clear infection in the bladder, and tincture, called, “Hydrangea and Eupatorium,” which replaced the Gabapentin and treated the symptoms of the UTI.

Additionally, I added ½ tsp of D-Mannose powder at each meal, and I stopped the Crananadin we were using, and switched to a straight cranberry pill. Because Sampson has had UTI’s also, I added the Cranberry, and D-Mannose powder to his diet as well.

Cranberry’s have an ingredient, A-type proanthocyanidin which helps to keep the bacteria from attaching itself to the walls of the bladder. D-Mannose has the same affect.  **Source, Prevention.Com** (You can read more about preventing UTI’s (in dogs and humans!) HERE.

When she went for her annual check-up the beginning of June, we checked her urine, and it was infection free. She just finished up the last of her tincture, and her latest voided urine sample was clean.

The problem is, we really don’t know what the underlying cause of the UTI’s is/was. Which means, I watch her very carefully.

During one of our visits to the vet, it was noted that Delilah had lost almost five pounds since September, which started us down another rabbit hole.

Thankfully, (I feel funny saying thankfully here) the weight loss coincided with her UTI, so this was another thing I brought to Dr. Landau’s attention, and in another post, I’ll tell you how we are treating this, and what it could be.

DISCLAIMER: I am not a veterinarian, I do not play one on TV, and I did not stay at a Holiday Inn Express last night. If your dog is showing signs of Urinary Tract Infections, or struggles to urinate, please take him/her to your veterinarian. The diagnosis we came to with Delilah is based on conversations and testing with a licensed veterinarian and is in no way intended to be a diagnosis for your dog. Please DO NOT SELF DIAGNOSE your dog.

My Dog Has Morning ‘Wood’; What Your Neutered Dog’s Erection Might Mean

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So… back in December, Sampson had…um…a little ‘incident’.

I really wish she wouldn’t write about this.

I noticed when I got up in the morning that Sampson was licking himself. I mean, going to town, licking himself.

It was dark, and I was preoccupied getting ready for our walk, so I told him to “leave it” and went about my business.

After I had my pre-walk chores done, I grabbed Sampson’s harness and when I approached him, I noticed he was once again licking himself. I turned on the light to see what had his attention.

Can a neutered dog have an erection?

Speaking of attention…his little ‘soldier’ was at attention, and as I turned on the light, a drop of blood fell from the tip of his penis onto the floor.

“Oh my God!” I exclaimed to Hubby, “He’s bleeding from his penis!”

I called the emergency vet and explained the situation.She asked me a couple of questions, and as I was answering them, I noticed that the area in question appeared to be very red and….hem, hem,… bigger than normal.

Well you know how I roll, SO…

I reached down and gave it a gentle squeeze.

I was startled to discover, it was quite hard.

I mentioned this to the young woman on the phone, and asked what I should do. To her credit, she didn’t laugh, or give me any lewd suggestions.

Now, I don’t mean to be indelicate here, and I don’t mean to blow my own horn, but if the situation included a male person, I’d definitely have ideas on how to handle it.

But this is my dog, and I’m not going there, because that’s just gross. (And if you came here for that, this post isn’t for you, so please move along).

The vet’s office mentioned I could give it a few minutes and see if it went away, or I could try icing it.

I’m just going to let you picture that for a minute. Me, sitting in the dark crying, while holding a bag of peas to my dog’s bleeding penis.

As luck would have it, I didn’t have any peas.

So, I told the girl I’d much rather bring him in and could be there in less than 20 minutes.

I hung up and said to Hubby, “I’m going to get the car ready!”

At which point, Sampson jumped up ready for his walk.

I took a breath then, (well, if he can jump and walk, it can’t be THAT uncomfortable, am I right?) Let’s see how he pees…it’s only hearsay to me, but from what I understand, peeing in that condition isn’t very easy.

So I said to Hubby, “Let me try a walk and see if I can get a urine sample.” I grabbed my urine collecting tools and out the door we went.

Because no-one should start the morning with dog pee on them.

Sampson didn’t seem to have any issues walking, nor did he struggle to urinate, or pee more than he usually does on a walk.

I called the emergency vet back, and told her I felt like we could wait the hour until I could reach my own vet. (My vet’s office has a vet who checks phone calls beginning at 7:00, even though they don’t open until 8:30).

When I spoke to my vet, she said someone should definitely look at him. When I asked her about the stiffy he was sporting, she suggested he may have found the licking…enjoyable.

I hung up the phone and said, “Great, my dog has morning wood.”

Sigh.

I have to say it, you know I do.

“Why does a dog lick himself?” and the answer is, “Because he can.”

If I keep my eyes closed, I can pretend this never happened.

When the vet’s office opened, I scheduled an appointment and brought him in.  While they ran the urine sample, Dr. Dupre gave him a physical exam and then she performed a Prostate exam.

To say this wasn’t well received is an understatement. I almost had to lay on Sampson to keep him still. If his eyes could have spun in his head, they would have.

Dr. Dupre couldn’t feel anything abnormal during the exam, so we did an x-ray.

The x-ray showed Sampson had a bit of stool in his system, so the Prostate wasn’t fully visible but there was nothing alarming. There was a slight shadow under his spine that could have been a lymph node, but again, nothing alarming.

After all of this, it was determined that Sampson had injured his prepuce (the skin sheath that covers the penis when it’s not peeping out) and with whatever licking he had done, he’d gotten an infection.

I had to think about it to figure out HOW he injured himself, but then I remembered the week before he’d seen his friend Mrs. Whinnem at her front door, and he was so excited, he tried to climb her steps, but they were steep and his back legs let go and he slid a bit on the cement. That had to have been when it happened.

We went home with some ointment that had to be squeezed into the prepuce and some antibiotics.

Ointment that had to be squeezed into his penis. Twice a day. I was afraid he’d start getting ideas…

As we were leaving, Dr. Allen was coming back from lunch. She stopped to say hello, and I told her what was going on, so while I was getting Sampson’s ramp ready, Dr. Allen was observing Sampson. She watched him pee, and then she took a quick look at his junk when he got into the car. Basically, we had two exams. 🙂 Dr. Allen agreed with Dr. Dupre’s assessment.

So we had an answer for the blood, but no idea why he was having an erection.

Conversations with my vet were…interesting, and I will admit, we did get a few good jokes about it, especially as she was asking around on forums only available to veterinarians.

What reasons are there for a neutered dog to have an erection?

There were a few theories about what could have caused the chubby, (besides the enjoyable bit).

One theory was that little nodule on his adrenal gland, (that we discovered in February of last year), had begun secreting some type of hormones.

The second theory was sex glands. Apparently there are two sets of sex glands in male dogs. The testicles (which most vets remove when neutering), and there are another set at the base of the penis shaft.  Sometimes when Sampson is super happy, that second set pops up like two little marbles. And then I always ask him if he’s happy to see me. 🙂

A third theory, which is the one we all seem to be leaning towards, at least with Sampson is, when he really has to urinate, he gets an erection, because yes, it has also happened in the afternoons, and it continued to happen after the infection was cleared up.  Each time, I would take a urine sample in, and with the exception of once, he didn’t have a UTI.

The final theory of course, is the Urinary tract infection, which Sampson initially had.  But once it was cleared up, the erections continued.

I think a lot of Sampson’s issues could have been when he scraped his penis, as the further we’ve gotten away from December, the less frequently these erections occur. But you can bet your boots if he’s really paying attention to that area, I’m going to watch it, and possibly get a urine sample.

Author’s note: I tried bringing some humor to a somewhat delicate topic, I can find the humor after the situation, but that doesn’t mean I didn’t and I don’t take this seriously, because I do.

DISCLAIMER: I am not a veterinarian, I do not play one on TV, and I did not stay at a Holiday Inn Express last night. If your dog is having an erection, has frequent urination, or struggles to urinate, please take him to your veterinarian. The conclusion we came to with Sampson is based on conversations and testing with a licensed veterinarian and is in no way intended to be a diagnosis for your dog. Please DO NOT SELF DIAGNOSE your dog.

Who’s Been Peeing In My Bed?

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So… if you have dogs, you know that sometimes accidents happen. By accidents, I mean the kinds that leave stains on your rugs.

Not wet beds.

The first time it happened I wasn’t sure what IT was. All I know was I climbed into bed and my bed sheets and coverings were damp.

This started us on a month’s (not one, not two, not even three months….) long (I’m talking long, like six months long) quest to determine what was going on and with whom.

The obvious thought was that someone had peed on the bed.

My dogs are Labradors. They are funny and goofy and they can also be assholes at times, but I just couldn’t imagine either one of them deliberately peeing on my bed.  They aren’t cats after all (no offense to my feline loving readers), because I’ve heard when you piss off certain cats…you might actually get pissed on.

Who you calling goofy?

The wet bed went on for some time. There were days, weeks even, when the beds were dry. Then suddenly, one day, there’d be wet beds.

We couldn’t be sure what IT was, or WHO was doing it. Because of Sampson’s bum knee, both dogs were upstairs with access to the bed.  Finally, one day Sampson had been downstairs all day with my mom and the bed was wet, that’s when I knew it was Delilah.

Now, Delilah’s a pip. She’s a hoot and a half and she’s stubborn as hell and gives me a run for my money, but I couldn’t imagine her squatting on the bed and peeing on it. I know with cats (there’s that cat reference again, WTH?) they will sometimes go outside their box when they have urinary tract infections. The logical step for me, was to have her urine tested. But that turned up negative.

A couple of weeks later, the wetness happened again, and again I had Delilah’s urine checked and this time she did have a urinary tract infection. She was treated for it and everything seemed ok for a couple of weeks, but then the wet spots started happening again.

The whole thing was puzzling to me. The wet spots would happen during the day when we weren’t home, but at night, when one would think we would be sleeping the deepest, (and more likely to be relaxed enough to let that bladder have its way) there was absolutely no wet spots.

All this yapping makes it hard for me to get my beauty rest.

Naturally I discussed it with my Vet who suggested that based upon Delilah’s age, she could be having some urine leakage. A lot of older, spayed females have trouble holding their urine. Like us, those muscles get weaker as age creeps up on us. Think sneezing or coughing…and whatever you do, don’t laugh too hard when you have to pee.

My Vet suggested trying Delilah on a low dose of estrogen, but I was hesitant to do so without knowing for sure if Delilah was leaking urine.

The Vet asked me, “Does it smell like pee?”

“What does dog pee smell like?” I asked her back.

Then, (oh for fuck’s sake, the things I do with these dogs) I put my face down as close as I dared to the wet spot and took a good sniff.

It didn’t smell like pee to me.

One night I was in bed watching TV and Delilah was next to me. I noticed she was licking her cooter intensely. When Delilah got up, there was a HUGE wet mark on the bed.

The next day, I called the Vet who suggested Delilah might be having a small bit of leaking, but in her attempts to clean it up, she was making a big, wet mess. The vet once again suggested a low dose of estrogen, but I really wanted to know if there was a natural way to help Delilah.

I checked with my friend Jodi Chick and she suggested a bladder support supplement.  I discussed it with the Vet who suggested Bladder Strength by Vetriscience. She explained it is a supplement they sometimes recommend for dogs on Estrogen, as an additional boost. I decided to try Delilah on it, before starting her on estrogen.  Bladder Strength by Vetriscience has a combination of herbs and other ingredients,  and the combination works like a natural estrogen.

We started Delilah on the Bladder Strength right away. In the meantime, I bought a waterproof mattress pad for my bed and every morning I would remove the comforter from the bed and place an old blanket on it to make sure my comforter wouldn’t get wet.

I also bought some bath mats, one for the area of the couch that Delilah likes to lay on and one for the new dog bed I bought for Sampson. I tucked that rug under the bed cover, because if I left it on the top, those asshole dogs would simply push it out of the way, and that was really defeating the purpose.

Every morning, just before I left for work, I made sure Delilah went outside and peed.

Things were going along great, until I decided to do a liver cleanse on Delilah and I stopped the supplement. Once it was out of her system, the wet spots started reappearing. One night I came upstairs from visiting mom, and there was a very strong pee smell. Delilah had been on Sampson’s new bed, and it looked like her bladder just let go.

Hubby and I decided, that’s it. She’s on the Bladder Strength, regardless of anything else she might need.

It took the Bladder Strength a good two weeks before the wet spots stopped appearing, but once it was in her system, it was amazing. For a dog Delilah’s size, she was supposed to take 2 ½ a day. I broke it up so she got 1 ½ at one meal, and a full one at the other.

We used the bladder strength for almost two full years before we needed to make changes in her regimen. But that’s another story, for another day.

From what I understand, estrogen is quite safe in low doses, but I always try a natural way first, both for myself and my dogs.

I am not a Veterinarian, I do not play a Veterinarian on TV, and I did not stay at a Holiday Inn Express last night. I’m sharing what worked for me and my dog after consulting with my Veterinarian. As always, consult with your own Vet if you have concerns about your pet.

 

 

 

 

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