And now he's not eating...New Approach
Update 2: Well I am going to try a new approach with Kirby. Honestly this not eating thing is getting REALLY OLD. I am about 99.9% sure this is a personality issue and not a health issue so that's why I haven't taken him to the vet. It started exactly when I started giving medications. He now has not eaten a whole meal in one sitting in about 3 days. He did not eat dinner (I don't think, I was making my own dinner and Franklin was caught in Kirby's crate licking the bowl! Lol) and he didn't touch his breakfast. My new approach is going to be you don't eat now, you don't eat. Meal time has become such a to-do with preparing the meal and getting him to eat (canned food, warm it in the microwave, mix well, pour on kibble, place kirby into crate, lots of praise, check on him every 10-15 minutes, etc) and honestly I have lost my patience for this game. This morning I did the normal routine of mixing the wet food in with his dry and placing him in his crate to eat (because now he will not eat if ANYBODY, including the cat, is near him). I gave him 15 minutes in his crate, and now I am picking up the food for the rest of the day. He is of an ok weight, I've put about 6 pounds on him since I got him, he still has another 3-4 to go but he isn't total skin and bones anymore so I'm going to try the starvation method and see if it works. I have a HUGE bag of food left for him which he loved before I started medicating him so I'm in no hurry to switch up the food at this point. We will see how starvation works as a motivator. Wish me luck! :-D
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Update: Kirby still isn't eating. I've tried changing the bowl he eats from and the location he is being fed. I'm leaving his food in his crate with him and then the bowl down at night. He will eventually eat his morning meal sometime while I am at work but will only eat a little of the evening meal and then leave the rest. I checked all over in his mouth to make sure there wasn't something causing him pain and there was nothing there. He will walk over to the bowl and nudge a bunch of food out onto the ground like he is looking for the hidden pills. There hasn't been a pill in it for I think about 4-5 days. Yesterday he tried to bury the whole bowl with his nose. I talked to the vet yesterday and we have changed the medication. She has a very anxious dog too so she knew more of how to help and what route to take than the other vet Kirby saw. We put him on Clomipramine (Clomicalm) and now I just need a ton of patience for the next 4-6 weeks for it to kick in. She said to quit giving the Ace (as I suspected) because it does nothing for the actual anxiety and is just tranquilizing him. Also no need to taper the Alprazolam since he only got 3 pills. She was thinking the Ace would make him MORE anxious since the anxiety would still be there but he would be tranquilzed so feel more vulnerable. We thought maybe that extra anxiety was why he wouldn't eat. No Ace today, still no eating. At what point do I switch food or mix in wet food or chicken broth to get him eating again?
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If its not one thing with Kirby its another! Finally figured the meds out, for now. The vet put him on alprazolam (Xanex) for his anxiety and the medication seemed to just make him much worse. She suggested adding in Acepromazine and using it in combination with the alprazolam but still I had a very anxious boy on my hands. The last few days I quit giving the Xanex all together because clearly it was making him more anxious. He is now on straight Acepromazine and that seems to be working. Problem is, Ace is a tranquilzer and I am not ok with just sedating my dog everyday. I want something that will help with his anxiety, not make a doggie zombie. I am going to talk to a different vet today at work and see what she suggests. The Thundershirt was a complete failure. I did as suggested and kept it on for short periods and he either became completely immobile and whined like crazy or tried to eat it so I took it back. The vet also suggested fish oil and glucosamine/chondrotin for his joints. I had him on ground flax seed already but CVS was having a buy one get one free sale so I got him some fish oil as well as the glucosamine.
My new issue is, he's not eating. I suspect its from the medication that before I was just throwing in his food. He is a chow hound and scarfs his food without chewing. Now I think he realizes there are meds in his food and he won't touch it. I've been just pilling him every morning and not putting anything in his food but now he will just go to his bowl and spill half the dish on the ground with his nose and then leave and go to sleep. This is a dog that I have JUST started putting weight on and can't afford to miss meals. I'm at a loss for what to do. I had previously put him in his crate and fed him there and that seemed to work but now that doesn't even work. There are no meds in his food anymore so I don't know why he continues not to eat. Its been about 3 days of him only eating one meal with effort and totally skipping breakfast. I know the common thought is keep his food down for 15 minutes then take it up and no food until the next meal, but he already knows the feeding schedule and he is so skinny as it is. Should I just put his food in his crate with him when I leave the house and let him eat it throughout the day? I'm hoping he realizes soon THERE ARE NO MEDICATIONS IN THE FOOD and starts eating again. How long do I wait for this to go on before I consider a food change? Its been about 5 days now of no meds in his food and since the issue first started.
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Roger/Laurie on
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Pill Pocket have worked well with Tenby. He is on daily meds and he quickly discovered the meds in his food. We use the pill pocket like a treat. He loves to catch treats, so we throw him a Charley Bear, then the pill pockets,and quickly another treat. He is just so excited about catching (and treats) we don't think he even tries to chew it.
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Permalink Reply by Yuki & Ellie on
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For Yuki, who gets a pill twice a day for his hypothyroidism, I stuff his pill into a separate treat rather than mixing it into his food. He's pretty darned smart and can pick the pill out of most foods. Since he loves fruits and vegetables, I've taken to using blueberries and raspberries to hide his medication (or tiny bits of our leftover meals if we're out of berries.) The berries are easy to push a pill into and he's usually so excited about the treat that he swallows everything whole. He has been on his meds for almost a year, now, and has come to expect that treat at the beginning of his meals. He gets so excited about it that he stops eating once he hears the cupboard open and then zooms in at top speed once he hears the pill bottle. :)
I know you said you haven't mixed anything into Kirby's food for awhile, but maybe you can get a really special treat, something he doesn't normally get, and stuff his medication into that and feed it to him separately.
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Permalink Reply by Melissa and Franklin! on
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pill pockets are just so darn expensive! That's why I was going to use the canned food since I don't plan on mixing it in his regular kibble for long, just long enough to get him eating again. I may just buy a pack of American Cheese slices and use that, that's what we did for my old dog. He is very suspicious of the kibble and was basically trying to lick the canned food off the kibble this morning, it was mixed well though so he ended up inadvertantly eating his kibble too lol. His new meds are capsules so have no flavor so I'm hoping that hiding it in a meatball will be enough since even if he did discover it it won't taste like anything like I"m guessing the other meds did.
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Permalink Reply by Beth on
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I've had good luck with cream cheese. It's cheap. You can form it to whatever size ball you need. The dogs love it. When Jack needed pills as a pup for whatchy-cally--- that protozoa thing that puppies get, the name escapes me--- we used cream cheese. Just wad it around the pill. It's smooth and it's cold and so the dogs just gulp.
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Permalink Reply by Chris, Kadi & Brodie on
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I found the Pill Pockets here are only about $9 a bag, so you might check around on pricing. You might be able to order them cheaper than that. Brodie is actually the one that gets pilled the most and his allergies are so bad I have to give him Benadryl every morning. I use the Velveeta for that and he now comes and gets me every day and takes me to the medicine cabinet to get his pill, then herds me to the kitchen to get his Velveeta. He watches me put the pill in, then gulps it down whole and licks the knife I use to cut off a chunk! When Kadi is already around, she insists on her chunk of Velveeta too, so she gets it minus the pill!
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Permalink Reply by Vicki/Kurt Pegel on
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Melissa how is Kirby doing ?
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Little stinker is driving me up the wall! I had been mixing about 1 tbsp of wet food with water and heating it in the microwave and mixing it with his kibble. This worked great for a while to get him eating again. I was using some other wet food to make meatballs with his pills in it. Well today he quit eating again. He wouldn't eat his breakfast so I left it in his crate and he finished it by the time it was dinner. Now he won't finish his dinner. He discovered the pills and will eat the whole meatball and spit out the pills so I"m having to just shove them down his throat which I think is the main cause for him not eating.
I am going to try pill pockets but I suspect he is just going to chew the pill pocket and discover the pill inside then spit it out like he has done with everything else I've tried. I am not looking forward to a potential lifetime of doing this twice a day....
On a good note though he likes his new giant crate! :-D
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Permalink Reply by Sarah C. on
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Try disassociating meal time from pills all together. Go and buy a pill gun. They're wicked cheap and very easy to use. And a lot less tramatic than trying to thrust a pill down their throat.
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When I had to give pills I did it in a glob of peanut butter, the peanut butter is so sticky they didnt even notice. But I agree with Sarah try giving the pills at a different time than at meal time. Glad he is liking his new giant crate.
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I seperate pilling and feeding by about 20 minutes. The morning routine is he gets his pills and then we go for a walk then both dogs get fed. Today he didn't eat at all. I'll try peanut butter next. I have a bag of pill pockets on the way. I have about 2-3 weeks worth of these capsules from the vet and after I run out I am going to see if they can be compounded into a beef chew. I've only been doing this for a short time and already I am tired of this game. I think if it was a beef chew he would eat it right up because he loved the calm treats I used to give him. Then MAYBE he will start eating again. He pushes all the food out of the bowl onto the ground still like he's trying to find the hidden pill then he eats it off the ground. Yesterday when I came home at lunch he had burried the bowl in a towel. I kept it in there when I left again and by the time I came home after work he had decided it was safe to eat.
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Permalink Reply by Lindsey Corkern on
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Melissa -
Hang in there, you are doing a great job! How lucky Kirby is to have someone so dedicated to helping him find his happiness in life. I don't have much experience in using those medications, but I have experienced food issues with my pem, Leia. She is a picky eater. I have to change things up occasionally to keep her interested in her food. I withhold treats about 3 hours before meal time to be sure that she is hungry. I also don't give any high fat or large treats after noon (doggy dinner is at 7). I alternate between chicken broth, water, and lowfat plain yogurt mixed in with kibble. When blueberries are cheap, I buy a large carton, wash and freeze the whole thing. Then I pull out a handful and plop some in her bowl (and a few more into my wine). She loves them and since they are about the size of her kibble, she eats well when I do that. When I need her to eat in one sitting and not split up her meal - she is known for eating half now and half later in the evening - I cut up her favorite soft treats and mix it with a bit of warm water. She eats that right away.
Another thing I had to do was not be so worried about meals. I know you are trying to get him to gain weight and that can be stressful on you. He may be picking up on that subtle signal you're inadvertently sending. I think I may have been doing that when Leia's food issues first developed. I made dinnertime seem as positive as I could, then I put the food down and walked away. I couldn't walk away and think about whether she was eating it or not, I had to get busy doing something else. It had to be something low key so that she wouldn't be more interested in what I was doing. Bottom line - I do dishes and clean the kitchen. She knows I'm not going anywhere, I'm relatively stationary and not talking to anyone, so the corgi is happy and she eats. Whew!
Don't give up - keep trying. Try what worked yesterday and then try what didn't work. I'm confident you'll get there with your experience and determination. You're doing a good thing. Keep doing it.
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thanks for the advice :-)
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