Lyla is an AKC registered French Bulldog I purchased from a breeder in November 2012. Lyla is blind in her right eye and has been so since shortly after birth. Her mother stepped on her and the nail punctured her eye. Other than appearance, you would never know. She shows no deficit. I did not spay Lyla, as I had hopes of breeding her. Lyla had been a healthy dog up until November of 2015.
Lyla had heat cycles every 6 months, but they were never regular. I wanted to wait until she was over 3 years old before I tried breeding her. She turned 3 in September 2015 and started her heat cycle in October. A few weeks after the cycle she started bleeding again. I didn't think too much of it, as she was always irregular with her cycles anyway. She started bleeding more than normal and started having an excessive amount of drainage, so I took her to my small town vet. He was not overly familiar with her breed, so he suggested another veterinarian to treat what he thought was Pyometra. I took her in to the recommended veterinarian to confirm the presumed diagnosis. She had Pyometra and would be taken in to surgery right away.
The veterinarian called me mid surgery to tell me that she was doing well with surgery, but there were two things they encountered; one was that Lyla's uterus was abnormally shaped and she would have never been able to have puppies, which would explain the irregular heat cycles. The other problem they told me that Lyla's colon was 3 times it's expected size. They had removed copious amounts of stool from her colon with an enema while she was under anesthesia. The vet asked if Lyla had any problems defecating in the past, and I told her that she hadn't. She only had a problem at the start of the infection, she seemed to be really constipated.
Lyla has a screw tail and the infection had gotten so bad that when I took her to the vet, I could no longer see her anus. Her skin had swelled around her tail and covered her anus, making it impossible for her to defecate. This is my theory to how the megacolon started. The vet believes that this is something that was congenital and with her since birth, but she never had a problem prior to this, so I find this difficult to believe.
Lyla recovered from her uterine surgery and the vet recommended a tail amputation to
prevent the tail from being the cause of constipation in the future. I decided to see how things went... In January 2016 we were heading back down the same road we had before... Her tail started swelling and she stopped defecating. I took her in to have her tail amputated. The surgery went well and another large amount of stool was removed from her colon during surgery. A few days later Lyla developed a urinary tract infection and colitis that was treated successfully with antibiotics. She was defecating what seemed to be normally for a few weeks.
The beginning of March 2016 we started going down the same path yet again with Lyla unable to defecate. She was taken in for another surgical enema to remove the stool. This was getting to be quite costly and not something I wanted us to go through every month. Doctor started Lyla on Reglan and Miralax to see if this would help her colon peristalsis. She was also started on a prescription food... Science Hills Diet I/D. I was to report back to see if this worked in a couple weeks.
Things took an unexpected turn on March 16, 2016. Before I went to bed that night, I noticed that Lyla was walking a little funny, but I thought that her leg was asleep and thought nothing of it. In the morning, Lyla was unable to move either of her back legs. She was paralyzed. I took her to the vet immediately. They confirmed my fears; Lyla was paralyzed due to what they diagnosed as Degenerative Disk Disease. I was devastated. She had just a slight deep tissue feeling in one foot, and nothing in the other. In this state, Lyla's prognosis was poor. The options were to take her to a spinal surgeon with a 20% chance of success and a price tag of $5000-$6000 minimum. Or I could try steroids and laser treatments to see if this helped. The only other option was to euthanize Lyla. This was never an option for me. She was only 3 years only, had a lot of life left. I was not giving up on my girl.
We left the vet's office after getting a steroid injection and a laser treatment. I returned 3 consecutive days for more laser treatments and steroid injections. Lyla was then started on an oral dose of steroids and twice a week laser treatments. During this time Lyla continued to have bowel issues. She had control of her bladder and somewhat over her bowel, but it was hard to tell due to the issues she had previously. I thought that the Reglan and Miralax were helping, but minimal amounts. Several times a day I would massage her belly to help facilitate defecation, but would get little results.
In the beginning of April, Lyla's veterinarian spoke with a gastrointestinal vet who recommended trying Cisipride, a motility medication that had been banned for human use in the United States. It would have to be compounded and ordered from Canada. I decided to give it a try, as nothing else seemed to be working. So I added the Cisapride to her Miralax regimen.
This new medication regimen had liquid stool seeping from Lyla's anus constantly. I couldn't let her on the carpet, otherwise there would be a mess wherever she went. This wasn't an issue in the beginning, as Lyla was confined to her kennel except for potty breaks to help facilitate her spinal healing. Slowly Lyla started getting more movement in her legs and feet. I even built her a doggy wheelchair to keep her from dragging and build her muscle strength. We continued laser treatments for 2 months. Lyla was able to gain 90% function back in her hind legs. She still has some weakness, so if she runs too fast, her legs can't keep up and will give out, but she is back to walking! I was skeptical of the laser treatments, but they worked miracles with my Lyla.
During this whole process, I was pretty emotional, but looking back, I do believe that Lyla's paralysis was due to a botched tail amputation. I am a registered nurse and I know that if Lyla's injury was between the shoulder blades like the vet tried to tell me, then she would not have had any control of her bladder. Be that as it may, I just wish the vet would have owned up to his mistake instead off passing it to something else. My girl is a fighter and she was able to pull through, even after he gave her almost no hope!
This is a little back ground of where we started...
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