Hot Weather and Your Pet

My poor Isabella has been sick since Independence Day and I think all this hot weather is to blame. Adam and I decided to take an afternoon walk that Sunday and Izzie tagged along. Well, perhaps “tagged along” is the wrong phrase because it turned into us dragging her along the road in the heat as we made our way to the dairy farm up the road from my parents’ house with frequent stops in the shade of the few trees that spotted the road.

I really should have known better than to bring her outside. She’s notoriously bad in hot weather (who wouldn’t be in that much fur!), so much so that even on tame 70 degree days when we bring her to the dog park in White Plains, she’ll spend most of her time huddled by me under the cement bench in the shade.

I feel really bad for what happened next. We brought her home and hosed her off because she got a little messy and that helped with the heat. She spent the rest of the day in her cool, water soaked fur on the kitchen floor. When we left later for a drive-in up in Butler, I got a frantic text message from my sister stating “Izzie s*** all over the house.”

Wonderful.

It seemed that while we were enjoying the antics of the lively toys of Toy Story 3, my dog was leaving odorous presents around the house as my mom was falling asleep to the drone of prime-time television.

The situation didn’t get much better on Monday. We held off food as is usually suggested for vomiting and diarrhea and because she was starving, she sneaked into the drip pan left underneath the grill from the BBQ and promptly vomited a disgusting black ooze all over my mother’s kitchen floor.

Suffice it to say, we had to be careful with her. Once we got the vomiting under control, we were able to move her to a strictly boiled chicken and rice diet but that didn’t help much with what was coming out of her other end. I was finally able to take her to the Veterinarian and he tested her for Giardia (an intestinal parasite that can also be passed to humans) and said that otherwise she seemed okay but to keep her on chicken and rice and call him in a few days to tell him how she was doing.

Of course, Isabella didn’t complain about getting home-cooked meals every day. But, she still wasn’t and isn’t 100%. The Veterinarian confirmed that it wasn’t Giardia that was causing the problem so we most likely just had to wait it out. On Monday I trekked back to the Veterinarian because now he wants her on Prescription Diet/WD to help in the stool department. It’s been two weeks now since the original incident and only now is “everything” getting back to normal.

Feeling sick didn’t stop her from tearing up the bathroom waste bucket while I was gone, so I think she’ll be just fine. 😉