Kailah - It's Been a Tough Week

Kailah came home from the hospital Friday night, so she spent Wednesday and Thursday evenings and most of the day Friday in the emergency care recuperating from several grand mal seizures.

The doctors have run a bunch of tests and we have been told the most probable cause of the seizures is a brain tumor. She has been filled with anti seizure medication and anti inflammatory steroids to minimize swelling of the brain. Tests also showed some thyroid issues, so she is on medications for that now too.

She will be on these drugs for the rest of her days. Unfortunately for the first week or so there are some fairly serious side effects. She has been staggering around in a kind of daze for the first 3 or 4 days. As she gets used to the meds, she will regain her sense of balance and mental focus, but this may take a week or so. The steroids leave her always thirsty and hungry all the time (may be worse than Tundra!).

We have no real answer for life expectancy. Brain scans or operations may give a better answer, but we opted to not go that route, as having the information in most cases, won't change the result. We have been told she may live a few months or many more years, so we hope for the best.

We know she had two grand mal seizures and we suspect she may a have had one more, but since the hospital stay, she has not had another, so the meds appear to be working. The first one we witnessed occurred while we were having dinner Wednesday evening. We rushed her to the vet and about 30 minutes after the first, she had a second at the vet's office. Both were very frightening to watch.

The next couple of weeks will be for close monitoring and getting the medication levels to the right levels, so we will most likely be back and forth to the vet for the near future. She is still very groggy, especially after we give her the pills.

We are all obviously very concerned and are worried sick about her.

We will keep the updates coming.