Full of Hope

So the Valium didn't work.

I gave Jack his second dose of Valium at about midnight, just before I went to bed. It was a struggle to wait that long, because his 'episodes' became more frequent and he was obviously in pain, and I gave it to him an hour earlier than it should have been. He staggered when he walked and had no strength in his muscles to even get up one step.

I hoped that the Valium would be enough to at least help him sleep through the night.

Unfortunately, this was not the case and he screamed in pain at 2.20am, waking us suddenly from a sound sleep. His body was stiff and his legs outstretched.

At 3am he needed to pee, so I began to walk him outside, but halfway along the hallway he began screaming again and his legs collapsed from under him as they went rigid with cramp.

It just didn't seem like a seizure to me, as the vet had suggested. Jack was fully aware of what was happening every time and he tried to shake the cramp out a couple of times, but it set in so that he had no control of his limbs ... just like us when we get a bad cramp.

At 4am, after Adoring Husband had left the bedroom because he was unable to sleep and was feeling traumatised by the whole Jack ordeal, I got my iPad out and did a search on Magnesium deficiency in dogs.

All the information that I could find showed that dogs have the same symptoms as humans when they are deficient in magnesium - cramps, muscle pain, muscle weakness, tics etc

So then I investigated what sort of magnesium was best for dogs and it seems that all forms are safe.

I got out of bed and found my bottle of pure magnesium oil in the kitchen - I sprayed it all over Jack's legs and feet, attempting to massage it in, but his muscles were still tender and he didn't like it, so I just sprayed the oil until it drenched the fur along the full length of his legs.

While he puffed and panted a lot, he stopped cramping up and I got to sleep for a couple of hours until Adoring Husband came noisily through the bedroom door at 6.30am asking if I wanted my coffee. I said yes, but I actually fell asleep once he left and I think it was about 8.30am when I opened my eyes again.

I got Jack up and let him walk through the house. Only once did a leg go a little stiff, but he continued to walk and it didn't cramp up. He was able to make it outside and while he was very slow on his feet, he did not appear to experience any pain.

Adoring Husband was supposed to sell Christmas cakes with his SES crew today, but instead, he decided to stay at home with Jack while Primrose and I drove into The Bay to do some grocery shopping and do the few chores that we were supposed to do on Saturday, until Jack's trauma prevented us from doing so.

AH was worried about spending the day alone with Jack because he was not confident about dealing with one of Jack's episodes. Luckily, there was only one moment, when somebody knocked on the door, when Jack got over excited and he had a bit of cramping, but nothing that AH couldn't handle.

Other than that, he's had a cramp free 16 hours. I put some more oil on his legs this afternoon at about 5pm and I've added a tiny bit of Himalayan salt to the dog's water bowl - as recommended by a couple of natural vets online.

I am very hopeful that this will be the answer to Jack's problem, because I do NOT want to resort to using anti-seizure medication. It bothers me a lot that we have to experiment with toxic drugs to figure out what is wrong.

We will test out the theory for another 24 hours before we decide about returning to the vet.

Fingers crossed.

Nite all.