Our 13 year old lab had a funny turn yesterday morning, seemed dizzy and drunk, collapsed and then had trouble walking. But since he is old and has increasingly bad arthritis in his back legs which makes him wobbly anyway, we just monitored him for the next few hours at home and he seemed to get better. He went out for an afternoon walk with no issues, he was alert and playful etc.
Then in the evening he collapsed again, this time it was obviously more serious, eyes roaming wildly, unable to focus on anything, weird head jerky movements, kept trying to get up but failing. We called out the emergency vet who said he'd had a cerebral incident, gave him an injection to reoxygenate his brain and a sedative to help him calm down. Said he would have to go to regular vet the next morning, he was very cagey about prognosis.
At this point I read loads of stuff on the internet about strokes in dogs and how vestibular syndrome is actually more probable than strokes, with the same symptoms but actually less serious and very good chances of a recovery. So I was sure he'd be showing signs of improvement in the morning.
But this morning dog was worse than yesterday, couldn't stand, couldn't walk. We couldn't get the tablets down him that the emergency vet had left, he wasn't interested in bits of cheese or ham or anything. It was like he didn't even realise we were there in front of him, didn't lift his head to look at us. Vomited and peed everywhere. Just getting him into he car and into the vets was petty traumatic, he was obviously distressed and didn't want to be moved, he couldn't even seem to lie down properly or control his limbs or head.
The vet was very pessimistic, by this point poor dog was just a completely passive thing lying on the floor with madly flicking eyes, not responding to anything around him. I started to realise for the first time maybe this isn't a recoverable thing...vet said he sees dogs with vestibular syndrome regularly, but they are nearly always more alert than this, and can at least stand and walk a little even if wobbly. It was absolutely devastating...DP started crying, it was the first time I have ever seen him cry in the 5 years we've been together.
We have left the dog at the vets for the day, they are going to do what they can but basically they have said if there are no signs of improvement today we might want to seriously think about putting him to sleep tonight. It was horrible leaving him there, but at the same time he seemed barely conscious of his surroundings or anyone at all, so not as heartbreaking as it could have been...
I cried buckets this morning, mentally we have been preparing ourselves for the dog's demise for a while as he is so old, and we are not the type to treat our dog like a child or anything. But this feels so sudden, he was totally fine 2 days ago and mostly fine even yesterday afternoon! I just can't believe it. Part of me still wonders if he could recover, but am I kidding myself? The vet seemed very pessimistic, and I don't want my poor dog to suffer this stress and indignity any more, but I also couldn't live with myself if we should have given him a few more days to recover...