Monday, December 7, 2009

Blitzen is sick....

I got called from school today (several times actually) that Blitzen was sick.  At first, I wasn't too worried.  He had thrown up a couple times.  But, I started to worry when they said he had thrown up 4 times and had exploding diarrhea.  Right before I got to the school to pick them up, they called again and said that he had rectal bleeding....OMG!!  I started to hit the panic button and drove just a little faster...  I picked them up and drove straight to the vet.  I honestly felt like I was rushing one of my children to the ER!!!

The vet was not worried about the bleeding.  (thank goodness).  He said when dogs have really bad diarrhea, it is common for them to bleed.  I think their bowels get that inflammed.  So, he started running down the list.  He tested him for parasites and for "overgrowing bacteria" in his bowel.  Both were negative.  Whew....  So he thinks it is viral.  He gave him two shots.  One for the vomiting (had a sedative in it, so he is very sleepy now) and one for his stools (actually helps the inflammation in his bowel).  He put him on a very regimented eating schedule through tomorrow.  If he isn't better by Wednesday or gets worse we are to bring him back in.  Our wonderful vet even told me to call him at home if he would get worse tonight.

He seems better tonight.  He hasn't gotten sick anymore.  He just wants to sleep.  No school for him tomorrow!!  I think I may call him into school tomorrow morning!  hehe.  All kidding aside....the teachers (and secretaries) were all so worried about him.  They really love him.  And so do we.....


Blitzen resting this evning.... sooo sweet.
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Beautiful Hannah...

How this journey started....

Hannah was born prematurely at 34 weeks gestation. She was a relatively healthy preemie; initially having difficulty maintaining body temperature and needing to grow. She weighed 4 pounds 9 ounces at birth. When she was four months old she began to drool, non stop. We were told the first year she was "teething." At 18 months old, we really started searching for reasons of why her shirt was always soaking wet. We saw various specialists who always sent us to another specialist, saying "everything looks okay." She spent years in oral motor/feeding therapy to help her not to drool. It wasn't until she was four years old and in preschool that we started to get some answers. Her preschool teacher commented one day that she wasn't reponding when her name was called. I took this information to her pediatrician who then orderd an EEG, "just to rule it out." Much to our shock and amazement, the results showed, she was having seizures. That is the day our journey REALLY began. Once she began taking seizure medication the drooling almost stopped completely. (She will still drool to this day when she is having seizure activity). Since then, it has been a roller coaster; countless medications and medication changes. She has never really reponded well to any medication.

About two years after she was diagnosed with epilepsy, the doctors noticed that her blood pressure was running high. After many tests, she was diagnosed with hypertension. We still are not sure why, but her cardiologist feels her blood vessels are thicker than normal.

About this same time, we also began looking into why Hannah was such a horrible sleeper. She would thrash, talk, move every which way, during her sleep. The sleep studies revealed that she has alveolar hypoventilation sydrome, which means she has too much carbon dioxide in her system when she sleeps. To help this, she wears a BI-PAP at night. This has been monumental in giving her more effective and quality of sleep.

Every day is a challenge for Hannah and our family as a whole. Blitzen has been an absolutely wonderful addition. She calms herself sometimes just by petting and loving on him. He has been trained in behavior disruptions and will sometimes be able to stop a meltdown from getting out of control.
It has been extra hard on the whole family since daddy is deployed to Iraq. He has been gone since January 09 and will gone until Jan 2010. We get to talk with him by phone and on the web cam; which is nice, but not the same!! Blitzen has helped to make his absence go just a little smoother....