January | 2015 | Praising Paws ♥

Sketch: The Missing Months of Dealing With Megaesophagus! Part Two

Posted on January 23, 2015 by D. Smith

As any dog lover knows, emergency surgeries, complications, tests, long vet stays… it all costs money and lots of it. Knowing Auburn wasn’t going to be cheap with their tests on Sketch, we began a “Go Fund Me” fundraiser for Sketch. Several people suggested it and while I wasn’t thrilled with asking for help, I knew I had to, for Sketch, but also for Chloe – my youngest daughter (13 yrs old when this all started) and Sketch’s “soul mate.”

Chloe has worked HARD doing her part in Sketch’s care. She has tirelessly held Sketch up after feedings, spent countless hours in prayer for him, been up all night with him more than once, held him while I’ve poked needles in him for sub q fluids and medicine injections, cleaned up more vomit/regurge than most people have even seen in their life, and so much more.

She told me herself that people would help us to Save Sketch – we only had to ask.

And so we did…. and she was right. People cared and they gave with all their hearts. It was humbling to see the outpouring of love our poor sick “free” dog on Craigslist was getting. People gave on the online Go Fund Me site and they gave to us privately. People just poured their hearts and money into our Sketch and Chloe’s hearts. It was truly an incredible experience! We raised almost four thousand dollars to go towards Sketch’s ever increasing medical expenses! It helped us more than I can say – both financially and in our hearts.

Picnic lunch and walking while Sketch was having tests done at Auburn University Small Animal Hospital.

Finally, Auburn gives us a diagnosis for Sketch. It was the Megaesophagus as I’d suspected, but he also had a kink in his intestines which was making it that much harder for food to move through his system. Another surgery would be required in order to fix this kink. We took Sketch home and began planning to take him back to Auburn for this next surgery.

Before we could even begin to plan, Sketch bloated AGAIN. I’m still not even sure how that happened as we were still hand feeding him very small meals, numerous times a day, but it did happen. And I must say, as far as Great Danes and bloat goes…. PLEASE, PLEASE… if you suspect any possibility of bloat, get an x-ray. Do not just go with what your vet says, no matter how much you love and trust them. Get x-rays. I LOVE our vet! I truly do, and can’t imagine taking my dogs anywhere else, but both times that Sketch bloated, they said they didn’t think it was bloat at all. He didn’t present like most dogs do that bloat, but because I insisted on x-rays, they were able to catch it and save him.

Back to surgery Sketch went and once again, there was torsion. He had the gastropexy done during the first bloat surgery, but it did NOT stop the torsion from occurring again for some reason. It wasn’t as severe, but it still happened. A lot of Great Dane owners believe that gastropexy will completely prevent torsion with bloat, but that is NOT true. Yes, it can help, but it’s NOT a guarantee.

Sketch made it through another emergency surgery for bloat with torsion (they also corrected the kink in his intestines while in there) and once again we were more thankful than words can say. When he was able to come home again, it was back to upright feedings, vertical holds, sub q fluids and tons of love.

Sketch getting sub q fluids and love from Chloe.

Weight loss still being such a huge problem, we began checking into feeding tubes. We talked to our local vet and decided to try a temporary one.

Sketch home from getting his first temporary feeding tube.

We were so excited to be able to bypass his no longer working esophagus and use the tube to go straight into his tummy with the MUCH needed nutrition. It was awesome. While it lasted….. On only day two of having the feeding tube, Sketch stood up and regurged the tube right out of his tummy. We were devastated. Our vet looked to see if there were different tubes we could try, or something we could do, but wasn’t successful in the search. If we want to do a feeding tube, it will need to be a permanent one instead of a temporary. We’re currently continuing to feed him small meals with the highest calorie food we’ve been able to find and doing vertical holds. He had recently gained a little over 10 pounds, but sadly lost a good bit of it during a bout of aspiration pneumonia.

We’re currently continuing to feed him small meals with the highest calorie food we’ve been able to find and doing vertical holds after each time he’s fed. He had recently gained a little over 10 pounds, but sadly lost a good bit of it during his first bout of aspiration pneumonia.

Megaesophagus is a horrible disease, but many dogs still live long lives with the proper care. We’re still struggling to get weight on Sketch and keep it on him. He can’t run and play the way he used to due to needing to not use up any calories, but there’s still a light that shines from him and lets us know that he is NOT done with this world – he still has more to do, share, experience, and give.

Sketch is a very inspiring Great Dane with a will to live unlike any I’ve witnessed in my own life so far. His joy is utterly contagious and makes you want to experience life beside him. God has answered many prayers concerning Sketch and I’m curious to see what happens next in this life we now share with our MegaE dog.

Sketch and Daddy praying 🙂

Sketch, Chloe, and Isaiah

Do you have a dog with MegaE? I’d love for you to comment and tell me your story! With knowledge being shared, more dogs can be saved!

Until next time, Sketch says to have a wonderful day of full tummies and lots of extra love!

Sketch and Chloe

Sketch: The Missing Months of Dealing With Megaesophagus! Part One

Posted on January 23, 2015 by D. Smith

Hello again – It’s been months since I posted. We adopted our fourth Great Dane, Sketch, and were watching he and Isaiah grow like weeds when the unthinkable happened…. Sketch bloated. As of June 30th, 2014, our lives were suddenly very different.

Anyone who loves Great Danes and has them in their life knows, and greatly fears, bloat. You read about it and do everything to try and prevent it from happening to your fur baby. We did the same. We followed all the “rules” for keeping the bloat monster at bay. Unfortunately, the bloat monster doesn’t play by the rules we were following.

Sketch underwent emergency surgery at our local vet when x-rays showed bloat with torsion (twisting of the stomach). He pulled through the surgery like a champ and it seemed like everything would be back to normal in time. However, as time went by Sketch wasn’t recovering his ability to eat and keep food down. We tried everything and I do mean – e v e r y t h i n g . He began to lose a LOT of weight and things got very scary. He was “vomiting” pretty much everything he took in.

Our local vet did a barium study, but didn’t come up with a diagnosis for anything, they did loads of blood work and various tests…. but came up blank. Sketch continued to lose weight and we were becoming VERY afraid of losing him.

At the vet – Losing weight and losing more weight…

Then a friend sent me a website describing an illness that affects some dogs called Megaesophagus. I read that article and a “knowing” just dug deep in my own gut and I KNEW – this is the answer. This is what Sketch is dealing with. So, we began to learn more and more about MegaE and what to do about it and I began a dialogue with our local vet.

At home, we went ahead and began treating Sketch as if we had the diagnosis of the MegaE since everything we read about it fit him and what was going on. We had a friend come over and build Sketch a Bailey Chair, which is basically a doggy highchair that’s used to help keep them in an upright position in order to help the food they eat move through the esophagus and on into the stomach. Being in this upright, vertical, position gives gravity a chance to work on the food since the esophagus is no longer doing its work in pushing the food downward.

Sketch’s first Bailey Chair – almost done building it!

Even with all our tireless efforts with feeding Sketch, and doing 30 to 45 minute vertical holds, we still weren’t seeing much in the way of weight gain and we wanted to know if we were correct in our own diagnosis of the MegaE. Our local vet referred us to Auburn University Small Animal Hospital for more tests. Off to Auburn we went, taking Isaiah with us for Sketch’s, and our own, moral support.