Our Peruvian Viringos - neurodegenerative disease

End of the year! Zara is doing ok, she has noticeably declined since the beginning of the year but that's not entirely unexpected given that she's 11. She's less playful, and doesn't often bring tennis balls back when you throw them. She will play for a little bit (a couple of tosses) and then stop playing. She still gets excited to go out for walks so we've been doing walks and trying to do weekly 2 mile hikes. As always Zara is difficult to put weight on and she's still stubborn and very sweet. We re-evaluated her quality of life, and it has definitely declined since last time. But still not in the "bad quality of life", and she still seems to want to be here. Mostly eats her food, enjoys spending time with us. I will need to start looking into end of life care/euthanasia for her though so I know what's available before we need it. She is a wildcard though and has bounced back before, we never thought she'd make it this far but she is still h...

It's been a few months since the last Zara update. She's still mostly doing alright. New neighbors have a dog that likes to bark a lot so we've started giving Zara some CBD oil as needed (it helps sassy so figured we'd give it a shot with Zara). It seems to help a lot, and after taking it she calms down a lot faster but is still very much present. Unlike the trazadone which kind of makes her a zombie or she just paces a lot after taking it. We've also been hiking every week with her still, she gets excited when we pull into the trail parking lot. And we still play at home but not as much, she'll chase the tennis ball a little but then isn't as interested. We are still struggling with her eating consistently, she will eat pretty consistently for like 2-3 days then eat nothing for a day then eat maybe one meal. So she's still getting the meatballs 3x a day to try to supplement. We did try the entice again and it does make her hungry, just not hungry enough...

First off Zara is 11!!! Which is a huge milestone for her!! Zara is doing better than previously this month, she had a senior wellness exam and everything looks pretty good. She has 1 more day of antibiotics for the UTI (they did a 30 day treatment this time), she's eating pretty consistently even if it's not the royal canin urinary SO food (it's Stella and Chewy freeze dried raw).  She also has a mild ear infection but we got ear drops for that, she's almost done with the 1 week course for the eardrops also. She's got a few little bumps, one on the back of her head and one on her left side near the ribs. But we're just documenting them for now and keeping an eye on them.  Due to the neurological disease we are going to try avoid removing them if possible, since anesthesia is particularly dangerous for her. Her weight is mostly stable, sometimes it goes down because she doesn't wanna eat and some days she eats a ton. When she's back on the tylosin next w...

So the pad stickers are super inconsistent on how well they stay on. I got some grippy socks for zara and those seem a little less difficult to put on her and more consistent. They have grip on the top and bottom so if they get twisted there's still grip. She's still hit and miss with eating, some days she eats really well other days she'll eat like 1 meal. However she does love the satin balls and will eat those at any time, I've been giving her 3 a day to increase calories. No hike this week because I sprained my ankle while sleeping Wednesday night. It's mostly fine now, no bruising or swelling so I'm fine. Maybe a 2 mile hike next week. she's very dramatic about the socks being put on or taken off, but once they're on she walks a lot better.

Zara is gaining weight again. She's now getting meals 3x a day (doesn't always go for it) and 3 satin balls a day. She's up 1lb from Sunday which is quite a lot. Her movement has gotten better again, I think the 5 mile hike is just too much for her at this point, possibly due to how much weight she's lost also. It takes her longer to recover from it. To help with the movement I got some anti slip stickers for her pads, first application went well and they helped a lot and stayed on ~2 days. I cut out new stickers to put on today and they fell off almost immediately, even though her paws are clean and dry. So these are pretty inconsistent. I'll probably keep using them just to get through them since they do help a lot with her slipping when they stay on. I also ordered a set of anti slip socks, those might be a bit more intrusive for her but they might work better.

Zara's birthday is next month, if she makes it she'll be 11. She's been deteriorating pretty quickly the last couple of weeks. Having a harder time navigating the apartment, bumping into walls more frequently. When she tries to turn around she sometimes ends up sitting and she can't stand for very long anymore. She's also at the lowest weight she's been as an adult, 22lbs. When she eats she eats a lot, but she doesn't always eat twice a day when I feed her.  I ordered anti slip stickers to put on her pads to try to help with the smooth flooring, and I'm gonna put together satin balls (weight gain meatballs) tomorrow to try to get her weight up. We did a 4.76 mile hike Sunday so part of me is hoping that she's just still sore from that, but I don't know. She has a senior wellness appointment on July 10th, and if she makes it to then we will discuss when we should let her pass on. I've known this was coming for a long time, but it's still v...

Training Zara to eat better is working well! She eats most her meals now, and is expecting to play with the lure after finishing her food. Tonight instead of her normal parading the lure around after catching it she brought it with her onto the bed. It really is the highest value reward for her.