Kirby Isn't Wanting to Eat...

Two doses of the ace inhibitor benezebril which was the drug to lower Kirby's high, high protein levels in is blood and he has the associated anorexia. He ate a doggie treat and we were able to drop in the medication for nausea/vomiting and the sodium bicarbonate for excessive stomach acid which is a blessing. Where he has always eagerly eaten his new kidney diet dog food, now he just sniffs and leaves.

We have a call in to our vet at MSU and are anticipating her saying to drop the benezebril. I've read where often you can drop it and begin it at a lower dosage and build up. We'll see. This obviously is NOT going to work.

We talked to Jennifer, our vet student and she took all of our information to talk to Dr. Sullivant, our vet.  

About an hour or so ago he ate a piece of plain chicken and was very interested in it as opposed to his dog food.  He ate the binder chew, too.  Mostly he's been sleeping next to me.  Not doing the drooling and mouth breathing like he was earlier.

Our bodies, whether human or canine are so complex.  God designed everything to work so intricately and one or two things out of sync just throws the whole system off.  Poor little Kirby's kidneys are so sick and as is true of so many medications--right now even the medications to make him better are harsh on his kidneys.  We feel that we are so close to getting him help by means of medications that actually can help reverse some of the symptoms that are driving his kidney scores off the charts.

Jennifer just called and had talked with Dr. Sullivant about Kirby's condition.  She advised us to not give him the benezebril for a couple of days and if he gets better we will pretty much know that was the culprit and then try to reintroduce it at a lower dosage.  In the meanwhile, we are going to feed him a chicken and rice diet that we cook ourselves.  I asked her to find out how much he could eat a day and based on his weight, he needs 500 calories a day.  Theoretically he could have up to five chicken breasts a day.  That seems like way too much protein and of course, we would never give him that much but they say that's how much he could have.  I've got to get on the Ohio State website where they can help us develop a home diet for him.  In the meanwhile for supper, I've got some chicken breasts thawing and he can have white rice.  Funny that we eat brown rice because it's healthier but for him...white rice has less phosphorus.

Dr. Sullivant didn't really think that the benezebril was what was making him not want to eat but did agree that it was quite a coincidence that the two happened and there's no way to really know without trying him without it.  I know on so many occasions throughout my life I would have sworn that something was the cause of a particular response had I used a medication that day.  You just never know.  With a chronically ill person or pet there are more things that can go wrong than you can count.

Taking just one crisis at a time.  Trusting God to direct our paths.  Knowing that all things work together for good for those who love God and are called according to his purposes.  Romans 8:28