[Samiebaby]

I called the vet at 7:30 when they opened. They had a message saying that they were out until 2pm for a staff meeting. At the moment, Max was gagging/coughing so I slightly panicked and called the vet across the street from me that also has fabulous reviews. They were more than accommodating and had me bring Max in immediately. Of course, my vet called me back when I was on my way there (I had left a voicemail), but I kindly let them know I was on my way to another place and I will fax them the records.

As much as it killed me, I recorded Max during one of his episodes this morning so I could show the vet if he couldn't recreate the issue. This seemed to be helpful.

The new vet listened very carefully to Max's heart and lungs and said that everything sounded great. He pushed on Max's trachea (harder than our usual vet did yesterday) and it didn't make him cough/gag. I couldn't believe it!

He said he isn't ruling out the weak/collapsing trachea at all, but he decided to give me an antibiotic to treat any kind of infection, including KC. This was Doxy. Then, also gave me Tem-something-P (I don't have it sitting in front of me right now) to help with inflammation from allergies, etc. He's hoping that these two medicines will give Max some relief and clear it up. If they don't, it'll be quite obvious that it IS a trachea issue.

He did say that it IS quite uncommon for a weak/collapsing trachea to present so acutely and he's skeptical that this is the main issue. I, too, felt that it was strange that this issue had presented itself for the first time in 5 years of Max's life, but you never know. I'm praying the vet is right and it is something that is curable.

We have very minor trachea issues with Maggie but have never had x-rays done in her 7.5 years of life. It doesn't happen very often and her "reverse sneezing" is less scary than Max's "gagging".

Please pray for us that the medication does help and something curable is affecting Max instead of a major trachea issue :-/