Dog wakes up walking funny

My 11 yr old mutt who is about 75 lbs woke up today and was walking real funny like his hind legs were giving out. I just figured hes getting old and maybe he just slept funny. So i get home and its getting worse with his right front paw knuckling and his whole right side is weak. I took him to the vet and the vet ruled out a stroke because usually they will walk in circles and go blind in one eye. He said its probably a nerve thing in his neck or spine like a compressed disk. He gave him a steriod shot and gave me some steriod pills to give to him for the week. He said that should help him because he can still walk and isnt helpless. But if that doesnt help he will have to go see a spine specialist to have dye injected into his spine to see where the problem is. This is after they will take normal xrays and other stuff to rule out anything else. Has any1 else ran into this problem? if so can some1 give me some info ?

One of my dogs had a stroke and he didn't walk in circles, he was just partially paralyzed on one side. :shrug: He did get better over a period of a few weeks without any medications.

I hope you figure out what's going on with your dog! :fingerscr

thanks.. i have 2 dogs so maybe they were playing and he got injured somehow or maybe he jumped off the bed and landed funny and pinched a nerve or something.. thats what im hoping for.. thanks for responding so quick... if anyone else has any ideas or info it will be appreciated

It almost sounds like Intervertebral Disk Disease, otherwise known as Degenerative Disc Disease.

My dog has a very high pain threshold and was in a lot of pain when this happened to him... He was in the hospital for 2 nights as he completely lost the ability in his rear legs so he could not get up to eat or go outside to do his business.

I had to keep him lying down for a week or two and then keep him contained in a small area so that he was not moving around much for the next 6 - 8 weeks. With absolutely no stairs. It was sooooo hard!

This is a pretty long article about it, but you could google it or go to your favorite pet site and see what they have to say about it:

http://www.gcvs.com/surgery/interver.htm

Even after the rest he was having a really hard time and I was not happy with the prednisone and muscle relaxants, so I went looking for other ways to help.

What I came up with was liquid yucca - Yucca Intensive by Azmira that I purchase through 1800petmeds.com - here is a direct link to it so you can read up on it, along with 15 customer reviews:

http://www.1800petmeds.com/pdetail.asp?SK=10850

and also Dr. Garys, which looks a bit fly by nighty... and I purchase it from Ebay, but it really works! When we ran out one time and it took me a few days to get the next shipment there was a noticeable difference in Chance. He wasn't getting along as well, wasn't moving as well... not as interested in his toys, etc. This is a link to the site, but I think the prices might be a bit better on Ebay.

http://www.drgaryscure.com/

I had brought a bottle of the Dr. Garys to the emergency veterinarian who was treating Chance and she said that the Glucosamine and Chondroitin levels were a little low so she would suggest 3 capsules instead of the 2, which we did do for a long time and then eventually brought it down to 2 for maintenance. If he seems to be having a hard time then we up it back to 3 for a couple of days to a week to give him a little extra. We break up the dose, one in the morning and one before bed.

Of course this is getting a bit ahead.... but just in case in info is helpful I figured I would give it all to you at once....

Take care.
ChancesMom

but the funny thing is this all happened overnight.. he was fine yesterday.. sure he was slowing down from age but to go from walking fine to stumbling over in 1 day?

When this happened to Chance it happened over a period of about an hour.

He was fine... and then he yelped but I couldn't find anything wrong with him... then he looked like he was walking just a bit off, so I checked him over again as did my bf and could not find anything... within an hour he was walking like he was drunk and I called the ER vets, as it was after hours and we took him right in.