The story on Duke...

 

I've mentioned a few times that Duke started having seizures a few months ago.  It started just two weeks after our wedding, on the morning of New Year's Day.  Duke had been perfectly himself up until that morning, when he woke me up having what we know now as "focal seizures" affecting his face.  There was slobber everywhere, as he was launching it throughout the house.  He woke me up and I immediately thought he'd gotten something caught in his cheeks (jowls?) on the inside of his mouth.  He wouldn't calm down, wouldn't let us touch his face, but he knew who we were and would listen to directions.  We called our friend/vet tech extraordinaire Amy and she told us our only option was to head to the emergency vet clinic (Amy has a boxer with epilepsy, so she was a tremendous help in this process).

Duke was still having the seizures when we got there and they took him back to examine him.  He was severely dehydrated and his potassium levels were low and he was still seizing, so they decided to keep him at least for the day.  I think I cried all day long, because they didn't know what was wrong with him and the seizures kept happening despite dosing him with phenobarbital via IV.  That evening, the vet decided he thought it was meningitis and they would start high doses of steroids Sunday morning and keep him until we could take him to our vet Monday morning.

As that week went on, Duke had seizures every single day.  We saw one vet Monday morning who gave us more phenobarb (and told us it wasn't meningitis), another vet Wednesday when they didn't stop, went back to the emergency vet Wednesday night because he was having seizures all night, back to the Wednesday vet on Thursday, and finally we got to see the first vet (Monday's vet) again on Friday who suggested we dose him up with phenobarb, knocking him on his ass to "reset" his system.  Duke and I had slept all of 4 hours from Saturday morning to Friday morning. 
 

The vet we saw on Wednesday and Thursday believed Duke had a brain tumor (brain tumors are very common in boxers after the age of 5.  Duke turned 5 the week his seizures started.)  The only way to know if it's a brain tumor is to do an MRI or CT scan, which are only offered in Columbia or Overland Park and cost $1500.  If it is a brain tumor, surgery can be done, which is expensive and most dogs don't survive it.  I left Wednesday's appointment thinking we were going to have to put Duke down.

Monday/Friday's doctor (now our vet for everything) said that yes, it could be a tumor, but it could just be epilepsy.  Even if it was a tumor, we could just treat it like epilepsy until it became obvious that it wasn't epilepsy at all and that Duke wouldn't live a normal life.  We liked her outlook on it, and she had treated dogs, specifically boxers, with both tumors and epilepsy and we trusted her opinion.  Duke was drugged up that Friday and was somewhat comatose for the weekend, but the seizures stopped.  The medicine (phenobarbital, gabapentin, and potassium bromide) did the trick and we went the rest of January and February with only a few seizures here and there.  However, Duke was never the Duke from before.  He was more somber, never got excited, was just there.

Several visits over the last few months were because the seizures started happening more and other problems would pop up (like vomiting for no reason) and his dosages were changed around several times with success in that the seizures lessened.  We put Duke on a diet (Diamond Naturals Lite Lamb & Rice if you're interested, I swear by it) and lost 7 lbs. in 6 weeks at our last appointment in May.  He was "drunk dog" because the potassium bromide was too high since he'd lost weight, so his dosage was lowered.  For two weeks, we had a dog back.  He would run through the yard some and didn't sleep all the time.  But by mid-June, he wasn't drunk dog, but instead was disoriented, easily distracted, and pacing excessively. 

These symptoms have only gotten worse.  He will pace for up to three hours walking laps in our house.  He started running into things more and more and we realized about two weeks ago that the sight in his right eye was gone.  I had noticed his sight was not as good, but it became painfully obvious he could see nothing out of that right eye.  His depth perception is off, he has trouble jumping up in our bed and even the couch.  He's fallen off both in the last month.  He's like a pinball at home and at my work, just banging into everything as he paces and I know it has to hurt as he bangs his head into everything.

I started researching brain tumors in boxers despite everyone telling me not to.  For almost 8 months, I haven't.  I looked up side effects of the medicine he's on compared to the symptoms he had and sadly I'm at the conclusion that this may in fact be a brain tumor that is getting worse.  According to several websites the symptoms of brain tumors in dogs are the following:
behavior change
lethargy
irritability
compulsive walking
walk in circle
loss of habits that have been trained before
facial paralysis often cause by tumor in the lower part of the brain (brainstem)
lower intelligence
partial or fully blindness indicated that there is a tumor in optic nerve or hypothalamus
low energy level
decreased activities
seizures often caused by tumor in the cerebral cortex
confusion
disorientation
wobbliness and tremors indicating that there is a tumor in the cerebellum region of the brain that play an important role in the integration of sensory perception
loss the sense of smell often cause by tumor in the sensory system used for olfaction (olfactory system)

Duke is showing at least 11 of the above symptoms and they are things I can't cross match with symptoms of epilepsy or side effects of his medication.  Duke had a seizure last night that only effected his face (as most have only been focal seizures) but it took at least 10 minutes for him to "come back".  He tried to climb up the walls by our front door and I had to hold him until my husband could grab him so he wouldn't hurt himself.  To bring a dog out of a seizure, they recommend opening a can of dog food or letting them smell something familiar.  Before, just the smell of my hand or my shirt was enough to get Duke back, but last night a hot dog wasn't even working.  It was the worst I've ever seen as far as the aftermath of all the seizures he's had (which have been a lot in 7 1/2 months). 

I've made an appointment for tomorrow morning with our vet and I'm going to go in level headed with a list of his symptoms and ask her to just be straight with me.  I can't handle watching my dog suffer if it's not just a medicine issue that can be fixed.  Duke hasn't been "my" dog since the seizures started.  I feel terrible enough that he could be in pain and can't tell me or that he's unhappy and I've drug this out for my own sake.  I'm praying for honesty from the doctor, the ability to make the right decision for Duke, and understanding from my husband.  Sometimes I do think the worst in most situations, but I feel like I'm being as clear minded as possible.  I simply want what's best for Duke and our family.  And watching him like this isn't helping either of those.