Zeke the Diabetic Dog Passes Away

With great sadness we announce that Zeke has passed away on August 26, 2012.    Zeke had had a couple seizures in the night and was in quite bad shape.   Unfortunately I was out of town on a short vacation.  My husband took him him to a veterinarian who felt that the only option would be to put him to sleep.   Zeke would have been 16 years old in a few months on Dec. 1.   He lived a good long life and was a very loyal friend who I will miss for the rest of my life.  

Zeke had been diagnosed with dog diabetes in July 2007 but we were able to manage it ok with help from the veterinarian and with the right pet meds.  At the time I thought it was a death sentence for him but it turned out not to be.

In March of 2012 Zeke was diagnosed with canine kidney disease.  His symptoms included excessive drinking and urinating and very dilute urine that looked almost like water.    Zeke lived for about 6 months with the kidney disease. It was often difficult to get him to eat although I could usually find something that he would eat at least some of.

Shortly after being diagnosed with kidney disease Zeke had some other type of event occur that involved lots of circling for about an hour, followed by loss of eyesight in his one remaining good eye.  Our veterinary opthamalogist determined that the retina had detached in that eye for an unknown reason.  Zeke had cataract surgery in January 2008 and I was thankful that he regained eyesight for an additional 4 years.  Zeke lived his last 6 months in blindness.  It took him a month or two to adapt to the blindness.  For the first month he felt most comfortable hanging out in the bedroom.  After that he gradually resumed his normal habits of walking around the yard sniffing, laying under the desk in the home office, and laying on the rug in the family room.  

Zeke had been receiving 400 units of sub-cutaneous fluids at home daily and was pretty good up to the end, just a week prior to his death I had taken him for a walk.  Because of his age I only took him on half the usual walk, when it was time to turn around he kept pulling to continue on and it took me a few minutes to convince him to turn around.  So I didn't think he felt to bad at that time.  


Goodbye Zeke.  You have been a good friend and I will miss you.

Zeke Has Kidney Disease

Last Tuesday Zeke decided to stop eating and was being very finicky with food. I took him to his veterinarian who did blood work and an x-ray of his abdomen.  The X-ray was normal but Zekes bloodwork showed that his kidney disease has worsened since the last time it was checked in mid-march. His Creatinine went from 1.9 (which was just above the normal value of 1.8 in a dog) to 3.8.  His vet suspected that the kidney disease was causing him to be nauseated and to not want to eat.  She set me up with bags of subcutaneous fluid, tubing, and needles and showed me how to give Zeke fluids at home.    Zeke perked up almost right away after the first treatment so I was glad for that as I am not ready to see Zeke go.


I seem to have no problem doing the morning treatment of fluids.  But in the evening for some reason when I stick the needle in Zekes skin he always turns around, gives me a dirty look, and then barks at me for jabbing him and the needle comes out.  I am going to talk to his vet tomorrow.  Zeke seems to be doing much better with receiving the one fluid treatment per day he is getting.  I will see what she thinks about continuing that.