Always at my feet in life and always in my heart forever. Ryan came to me at 12 weeks old. The breeder said he PRD and he would be blind at a young age. Blindness is not a problem for me to deal with, also living here is a blind cat, dog and horse.
It didn’t take me long to realize Ryan had a problem with digestion. He had chronic cow ploppy type stool. For months we worked with diet, eliminating possible food allergies, environmental allergens etc. The issue was obviously in the upper intestine, he never had an accident in his crate, the minute he was outside he would almost always have a loose stool. We tried different antibiotics and steroids without any success. He was always hungry and wasn’t gaining weight.
One night he had bloody diarrhea and there was nothing I could do to help him. I took him to work ( I’m a vet tech.) we ran additional tests. His white blood count was very high and his platelets extremely low. I made the decision he needed to go to a more advanced care hospital, so off to Tufts Vet. hospital we went. In the following week he had a series of tests, X-rays, ultrasound, endoscopy, and other tests. The only definitive things found were, ulcers, caused by the chronic inflammation. The closest name to his condition was IBD. After 1 week I took him home, with meds and a hypo-allergic food. After 1 week I did more blood work and the Doctors at Tufts wanted him admitted again for IV fluids and to be closely monitored. His platelets were continuing to drop and we were worried about a bleed.Ryan spent another week at the hospital. The vets wanted to do an exploratory surgery to determine what was wrong. I decided not to do it. His platelets were too low and the risk to great. I decided to treat him with antibiotics and prednisone, among other meds.
You would have to know Ryan to understand how I feel about him. He is a fighter. He had no idea what was wrong and he didn’t seem to be in any pain. He absolutely loved being with me. He went to the barn with me and helped with the chores, played on hay bales and loved playing in the kiddie pool. The only problem Ryan had was the loose stool, it never resolved. He ate like a little pig and took his pills without an issue. All was seemingly fine otherwise for about 9 more months. Then in the fall after Ryans 2nd birthday he changed. He was getting picky about his food,there would be days when he only picked at his food. He wouldn’t take his pills and the worse was he would hide from me when I tried to pill him. I started to take a closer look at him … he was mostly depressed, not playing with the other dogs, staying at a distance from me to watch me do the chores. He never lost his enthusiasm to be outside with me, it was obvious he was in pain. He was an australian shepherd and his top weight was 24lbs. He now weighed 14lbs.
I made the heart breaking decision to let him go on 1-24-14. I’m having a difficult time understanding why such a young dog was so sick his whole life. Ryan will always have a special place in my heart. I held him in my arms and whispered in his ears how much I loved him and wished him a better life in his new world. I have to believe I will see him again…. I will always Love, Love, Love you Little Ry.
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