Some help for a friends dog

[ancientgirl]

Hi guys! My friend is worried about her dog. I was speaking with her this morning and she told me there's something wrong with him. We have an appointment for my vet tomorrow, but I was told to call this evening before the shift change to see if there are any cancellations. I told my friend if she sees no change in him or if he's worse, to just take him in anyway. It will be an emergency charge, but better safe than sorry. I offered to pay for this from a credit card I've been keeping in case of emergencies, since she's going through just as hard a time financially as I am.

I told her I'd post the details of what's going on with her dog in the hopes some of you might have an idea of what could be wrong with him or had a similar experience. The pup in question is Louie.

Here's the story:

This is exactly what I’ve seen… when I got home last night, he was fine. Gabriel took him out for a walk and he says that he pooped normal (not runny or bloody) and he peed and he didn’t puke or anything. Then I was petting his back and when I got near his stomach, I noticed he would twitch a bit. As the evening wore on, I noticed he would twitch even more until finally he would even cry every time I even touched his stomach area. Then I noticed he didn’t want to walk. He just wanted to lay down. And he was trembling too. But his nose was cold and wet so I didn’t think he had a fever but again, as the evening wore on… I started to notice that his nose was drier and warm so I gave him a Tylenol. Then I tried to walk him but he didn’t want to do anything. He would just put his muzzle and front paws low to the ground and his butt up in the air. Then walking up the stairs seemed to hurt him too. I didn’t know what else to do for him so I put him to bed and I kept checking up on him throughout the night but he was asleep each time. So… he didn’t eat anything or drink anything last night. Except Gabriel, in an attempt to check his appetite, gave him a piece of ham and he ate it. I took this as a good sign because if he felt THAT terrible, he wouldn’t have eaten it.

This morning, he walked down the stairs very gingerly and he peed but he didn’t poop. Then when it was time to go back up, he didn’t want to climb the stairs so I had to carry him up. When I got upstairs, he laid down on the rug right away and he didn’t move from there until it was time for me to leave. And that’s all I know. I checked his gums and initially they looked a little pale but then they looked alright. It’s like they fluctuate.

I’m hoping that he didn’t get worms or anything from that tick infestation we had a few weeks ago. I only ever found a single tick on him and it wasn’t that big and, of course, I promptly removed it. Besides, Gordo was the one that had a ton of them on him and he’s just fine. And Twiggy was the one that puked yesterday after we got home. But he’s fine too.

The only other thing I can think of is that the day before yesterday, I didn’t walk them in the morning because Gabriel’s been doing it but he didn’t walk them that day either because he was going about a job interview and he thought I had done it (because I hadn’t physically asked him that one time). I don’t know if holding it in all day might have caused an infection or something because there was no poop in the cage when I got home. But honestly, Twiggy could have eaten it if they HAD pooped in there. He’s done that before.

Any ideas or comments?