Buzz update

WARNING: descriptions of elimination..........

They "aren't supposed to" get GI upsets from chemo until 3-5 days later. Last week he was throwing up about 16 hours later, so this week I had him on the anti-vomit meds (sucralfate, metoclopamide) pre-emptively.

Yesterday he offered to eat grass every time he was out, so I had to watch him like a hawk to prevent that. In addition, he pooped several times, getting looser and looser. I put him back on the metronidazole and diawin for that, and gave him a tablespoon of canned pumpkin (NOT "pie mix," just plain pumpkin), but still got one liquid deposit at around 1:00 pm.

I called the onc (thank goodness for big outfits like MSU where you can get to a specialist on call, even evenings and weekends!), who said I was doing everything right, and if he continued with the diarrhea and added in vomiting, to take him to our vet.....

It was one of the lucky days -- no more attempts at pooping until this morning (sloppy but not liquid), and NO vomiting at all.

Whew.

He drank and ate ice, and was well-hydrated, and seemed pretty lively, all things considered.

Keep your fingers crossed for us over the next three days as we head into the time when the chemo is "supposed to" make him feel bad............


Two bits of random commentary -- it's a sad sign when you need to type "diarrhea" so many times that you actually learn how to spell it.

And -- I have asked each vet I have talked to in the last three weeks what I should be feeding him to help him get through all this. The response has basically been "Mumble, mumble" (aside from the prescription for I/D he came home with after being hospitalized last week). SO -- yesterday I tell the onc I gave him a tablespoon of pumpkin, and she tells me that was an excellent thing to do; that pumpkin feeds the cells of the gut so they are happier and less likely to be putting out distress signals to his whole body. SO -- WHY???? didn't she suggest to me, when I specifically asked her what to be doing about feeding him, that I give him pumpkin??????????????????????????????????????????

Sigh.

(I knew about pumpkin from the big corgi mailing list, and also people on caninecancer have talked about it.)