Incontinence?
I'm thinking that Sasha has developed some sort of incontinence. I have noticed wet spots in the house on occasion, with increasing frequency, that I figured was dog pee (I don't have a very good nose) and cleaned them up just in case it was, but I never really gave it much of a second thought. Until I decided to lay on the floor while watching a movie and... yeah.
For some reason I thought the perpetrator might have been Sasha, and I went to check the dogs to see if any of them had urinated recently. Juneau: clean. Conker: clean. Sasha: wet. So Sasha it is, my suspicions confirmed. But it didn't seem like a "normal" type of urination, the pee was spread around a bit, not just a small dribble on her lady spot. That seems more consistent with incontinence than regular urination.
I don't think it's a UTI. She's got no other symptoms that would suggest one, and it only seems to happen after she's been laying down for a while or asleep. She still goes outside to pee during the day and doesn't do so in a hurry, nor is it overly frequent or infrequent, and she drinks a normal amount. I have never noticed her to be in any sort of pain either.
Anywho, has anybody else dealt with this sort of thing before? I am going to keep a really close eye on Sasha for a while to see if it happens again, and if it does, I'll take her to the vet. But in the meantime, is there anything else I should be looking out for other than a puddle after rest or sleep?
If it is relevant, Sasha is a Border Collie X Labrador Retriever, 7 1/2 years old, was formerly overweight but is at a good weight now, I believe was spayed around 6 months old, and is moderately active.
For some reason I thought the perpetrator might have been Sasha, and I went to check the dogs to see if any of them had urinated recently. Juneau: clean. Conker: clean. Sasha: wet. So Sasha it is, my suspicions confirmed. But it didn't seem like a "normal" type of urination, the pee was spread around a bit, not just a small dribble on her lady spot. That seems more consistent with incontinence than regular urination.
I don't think it's a UTI. She's got no other symptoms that would suggest one, and it only seems to happen after she's been laying down for a while or asleep. She still goes outside to pee during the day and doesn't do so in a hurry, nor is it overly frequent or infrequent, and she drinks a normal amount. I have never noticed her to be in any sort of pain either.
Anywho, has anybody else dealt with this sort of thing before? I am going to keep a really close eye on Sasha for a while to see if it happens again, and if it does, I'll take her to the vet. But in the meantime, is there anything else I should be looking out for other than a puddle after rest or sleep?
If it is relevant, Sasha is a Border Collie X Labrador Retriever, 7 1/2 years old, was formerly overweight but is at a good weight now, I believe was spayed around 6 months old, and is moderately active.
Comments
Now- in order to get Reilly the prescription, way back when, she had vet visits to r/u UTI and then an ultrasound to rule out ectopic ureter- which is when the tube from the bladder to the outside world is misplaced. Reilly has been leaky since she was 8 months old, which is unusual, thus they wanted to check for physical abnormalities. Leakiness is fairly common in adult spayed female dogs- nobody talks about it... in Reilly's case I believe it is because she was spayed too young - 9 weeks at the shelter!- which is why I gave Juno many months before spaying. Vets will tell you "there is no good science saying there are any side effects to early spay" that's party because in general the party line is never dissuade anyone from spay/neuter and partly because there isnt a lot of research or a huge sample size- the only study I could find back then was one done in europe, I hope the US wakes up to this issue.
My sister's labrador also leaks sometimes- at rest- and was helped by the same medicine, But the difference was that her vet only checked for UTI and said "try Proin, if it helps then we know its spay incontinence" and she didnt have to go through excessive testing to get to the answer. It's common, treatable and you'll see not really much of a problem! Hugs to Sasha!
Mom doesn't seem to care...
So, I'm going to see if we can get her to the vet soon to have it checked out. Like before I don't think it's a UTI, there are no other symptoms, but I'd rather that be the case than actual permanent incontinence.
Then the vet and I (mostly me, but the vet helped) noticed a pattern with her leakage (it also happened while she was awake, not just when she was sleeping). It was much worse when she was having bad days (ataxia, stumbling, not able to get up without struggle, etc.). So, the vet feels that due to the brain tumour and multiple strokes, her nerves controlling her bladder (and not just her legs) are deficient.
Hopefully Sasha's issue is nothing like Nola's. But I would definitely take her to the vet to rule out an UTI and to try the Proin to see if it works.
Anywho, what I'm more concerned about is just getting Sasha to the vet. If Mom won't, I will, and I don't think Mom realizes (which I've explained several times) that the sooner Sasha goes to the vet, the sooner we know what's up and get it fixed, and the sooner the house won't keep getting dribbled on.
Sasha seems to know when she's dribbled. She gets really timid (not exactly normal for her) and avoids the area where it happened.
Anywho, I guess that's it! I hope it works.
The 'other drug' is DES- but we havent had to go there, and you may not with Sasha either. You have a lot of room to adjust Proin before you have to go to DES.
@Losech - Keep us updated on how the Proin works. Hopefully it will just take the 50mg and she will be leak free.
I hope the proin works for her.
However, she's lost some weight. The vet is not concerned (yet) but I am a bit, I guess nervous? About that. She was 51 pounds when I took her in, she weighs closer to 48 now. According to this paper, Proin has a small chance of causing weight loss, amongst other things. I have not noticed anything other than the weight loss. No increased heart rate, irritability, lethargy, etc. She is not getting any additional exercise.
Sasha has always needed less food than Juneau and Conker to maintain her weight. Now she gets almost twice as much, which is currently 2 cups of kibble, a very large hunk of meat/boney thing with some liver, and a bunch of leftovers, every day. I have not noticed any more weight loss since I upped her food, but I did that recently so I cannot be completely sure if she's stopped losing weight or what.