caution: I'm about to talk about dog poop.

[aithne]

Boone has been feeling under the weather for the last few days. He pretty much didn't eat this weekend, though he looked perfectly energetic and in fact spent an hour and a half on Saturday running around like a nut with a bunch of other dogs, and Sunday we went to another dog park and then for a three-mile walk.

I left Pip at home for Sunday's dog park adventure, because this was a new one and according to the Web site the entrances weren't gated. Pip, for all of her wonderful qualities, has kind of an issue with coming when called. As in, she doesn't unless she feels like it, and if there's something more interesting where she is (a stick, a ball, cat poop, air molecules), she doesn't feel like it.

We're working on it.

It turns out that the park would have been fine for Pip, since the entrances were pretty far away from the big open area all the dogs were in. And evidently, when we left without her, it was sob sob oh the misery they left me here BY MYSELF I'm so loooooooooonely! for a half hour. And when she was let out of the crate, the first thing she did was to run to the front window to make sure that Boone and I weren't hanging out in the front yard, just to fool her.

And Boone, at the dog park, ran around and sniffed and looked a bit intimidated by the huge romping dogs. In other words, he was acting perfectly normal. Sometimes he doesn't really eat for a couple of days; this is a dog who will never be fat, because he turns his nose up at food unless he's actually hungry. So we didn't worry about it much.

Then came Monday, and he was just...droopy. Ears lower than usual. Tail carried a bit low instead of curled over his back. Not coming to lick my legs when I got out of the shower. Pip said, Play with me! and he said Sorry, not feeling like it today. Which was worrisome enough, but when yesterday came and he was so droopy he was looking almost Phalene-like, it was time for a visit to the vet.

The vet poked and prodded him, tried to give him some of the Stinkiest Food In The World (Boone actually turned his back on the stinky food, but he's like that sometimes, doesn't accept food from strangers), and xrayed him. He thought there might be a blockage, and there was a suspicious area on the xray, but it was by no means conclusive.  And he was full of poop.  So he had been eating something.

This is hopefully the only time in this dog's life that I will be able to say to him, "I have SCIENTIFIC PROOF that you have to poop, dog!"

So I've been feeding him this laxative/lubricant stuff, and last night he ran around the back yard and did his thing, and this morning he's a lot perkier.  I had to coax him over, but he did come over and lick my legs after my shower.  And he had some breakfast, though he rooted around under the (expensive, good for him, made of freaking VENISON) canned food to eat the kibble underneath.  The dog, apparently, was constipated.  And doesn't really like his new food.

Argh.

Well, at least it wasn't serious.

Comments

[arielblue.livejournal.com]

Aww, poor pup! I'm glad he is feeling better.

Bear actually has a chronic constipation disorder called "feline megacolon" -- his colon doesn't have sufficient motility, and the poop builds up in there and gets so big it's hard to push out, plus his colon doesn't push hard enough anyway. He's on several medications for it. So constipation can actually be a serious thing, at least in cats. (Serious in terms of causing life-threatening problems, and serious in terms of "omg I just spent $250 at the vet to have my cat de-pooped" a couple times a year. Sigh.)

[silenceleigh.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I know chronic constipation can be a bad bad thing, but fortunately he's not showing any signs of megacolon, just a tendency to get stopped up occasionally.