My Life with Dogs » Bandit

Well, I learned the hard way not to leave food on my counters.   After losing a bag of nuts and a whole tin of hot cocoa (that was fun to clean up…), I make sure before I leave the house that all food is well out of reach….but what about canned food?   Shouldn’t be an issue, right?

Well, I had all my chili fixings on the counter, cans of beans, tomatoes, and of course, the Rotel diced tomotoes with chilies already chopped up – yum!    Well, I went out shopping – I know I was not gone more than 45 minutes, but when I came home all three kids met me at the door from the garage into the kitchen….and I saw it.  

The poor can of Rotel tomatoes and chilies after Bandit got ahold of it!

A can was lying on the floor.  At first, I thought it was an empty can of dogfood that I did leave on the sink.  But, after closer investigation, I saw it was a full can of something – the label was gone.  The remains of the label told me it was the Rotel.   The teethmarks in the can had pierced the can numerous times.  The liquid had obviously spilled out – and probably licked up too!   Hopefully, the picture does this justice.

All I could do was laugh….Bandit looked so innocent with his soft brown eye…but behind those eyes is a ruthless food thief…a bandit if you will!   So, what to do?  I made chili of course!   It was a little tough to open the can, but you shouldn’t waste food, right?

While I was on vacation, I boarded Bandit and Shelby at the Yorkville Animal Hospital.  They are really great with them, and I feel better that Bandit is at a vet in case anything happens.  Well, sure enough, when I returned, they told me that he had a grand mal seizure on 2/23, and they gave him valium and he was fine.  It was actually the day before I had requested that he be upped on his meds.  I know that he can have seizures when he gets excited, and I try to plan for it, but I missed it…

Thankfully, he is o.k. and did not have any further seizures now that I have him home.

Unfortunately,  Bandit had a series of seizures after I returned from WV.  The seizures started at 7:50 a.m and he actually had the seizure in bed with me.   The other dogs seem to know to stay away.

Baby Bandit

The seizure was short, but it is the recovery that is long.   I helped him out of bed and he stumbled around while I followed him.  He went into the bathroom, then fell down and had a second seizure.   He started to come out of it, then he went into a third seizure.    I called the emergency vet clinic, and they said I should bring him in.    I called Lilia to help me carry him to the car.

When she came over, Bandit had again started recovery.   He paced and stumbled, but he did not have another seizure.  I decided not to take him to the hospital, but I gave him some extra phenobarbital.   The entire episode lasted nearly one hour.

I called the Yorkville Animal Hospital, and they said he did not have any seizures when he was there.   Then, they said something that made sense – they said that after he has been excited or stressed, when an epileptic dog gets back to his calm home situation, that is when they have seizures.   

This has been the pattern – after Bandit has been excited, i.e. he is boarded somewhere while I am on a trip, when he gets home, he has the seizure!   His neurologist did say to give him additional phenobarbital when he is in a stressful situation.   I guess I didn’t think that boarding him at the Yorkville Animal Hospital would stress him.   But, now I know better…

The whole rest of the day, Bandit followed me around – even more than usual.   It was so funny – I would stand up and walk a few steps, with Bandit at my side.  I stop – he stops.   I walk a few steps, Bandit walks a few steps.  I stop, he stops!  It was so funny!