Our first diagnosis

Warning--this episode is a little gross, if you don't like to hear about dogs barfing!  For us, it is all in a day's work.

After the dog show fiasco, we settled into a relatively quiet life, for a brief time, anyway.  I was home working on my sabbatical project, trying to train Hobbes, and keeping the girls entertained as well.  I can't say it was terribly exciting.  We had gotten a little concerned because Hobbes seemed to be having barfing episodes (that's what we called what he was doing) most frequently at night.  He would make a noise that sounded like Tigger coughing up a hairball, and then spit out a little liquid, food, grass--whatever he had been chewing on before bed.  Our vet suggested that we give him just a little bit of food after his very last potty break, which was around 11:30 at night, to keep his tummy settled.  Seemed to work for about a week.

One night, however, Hobbes made horrible wretching noises.  He sounded like he was choking.  Then, around 3 in the morning, he coughed up his food.  But it wasn't digested--it was swollen!  His kibble looked like it had been soaking in water for a couple of hours.  He sounded so awful, and the food thing was so weird, that I called the vets' office the next morning.  Jada already had an appointment for early afternoon to have her thyroid levels checked (poor girl is hypothyroid), so we asked if we could bring Hobbes along.  Our regular vet was out for the week (at a conference, so he claims--I just bet <grin>) so we saw one of his associates--someone we have seen and worked with extensively.  Needless to say, we trusted him absolutely.  And that trust was rewarded.

After x-raying Hobbes to see if he had any blockages, the dr. suggested a final, non-invasive test.  Hobbes would be anesthetized and then given some barium to drink.  He would then be rushed to the x-ray machine, allowing the doc to follow the barium through the digestive tract.  Sounded fine with me, so I took Jada home (her thyroid meds were working just fine) and waited for the call.

I hadn't been home for half an hour when the phone rang.  The vet sounded deeply upset.  He was afraid that he had guessed correctly, and that Hobbes has something called mega-esophagus.  Of course I had no idea what that meant.  He told us that Hobbes was coming out of the anesthetic, and we could pick him up in about an hour.  Of course I immediately went to my computer and started searching for this odd condition.  I located a bit of information on it, then called my husband.  We agreed to meet at the vets, so we could hear the diagnosis and management of this condition together. 

At the vets, we were given a handout that talked about mega-e (as we call it now), how to manage it, and what to expect.  We were told that Hobbes might live for about 6 months with this condition, and likely would succumb to aspiration pneumonia.  We were devastated.