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Originally Posted by Mistymillar  Not just the food. He was on steroids for several months and weaned off not long ago, he takes two different antihistamines every day and baths about 3 times a week with malaseb and episooth. He has to wear jammies when we are at work and at night as if he scratches even just a little he breaks his skin. When we saw the vet derm he was rated at around 9 or 10 out of 10 for itchiness he is now mostly a 2 but can sometimes go to 3or 4 still ( no idea what sets it off as I am really strict about making sure he doesn't get crumbs of anything) if it is dust mites there is really nothing we will be able to do.
He is a year old on 6th August and will be old enough for allergy testing, so we are hoping there is something specific that we can eradicate.
His pictures at his worst are quite horrific, they are so bad that I am sure some people think that we were lazy about getting him treatment. Absolutely not the case as we were at the vet weekly I went to the derm without a referral from my own vet as I was just so devastated for him and he was so miserable. Nobody would believe it was allergies as he was so young.
My vet derm has supported me to make decisions about giving him steroids if he has a major flare up and I have a supply so we don't have to wait for an appointment. I won't do it unless I really have to as I worry about shortening his life with heavy meds, but I know that if he ever got anywhere near that state again I would prefer he had a happy shorter life than go through the awful, miserable time he had before. |
I just want you to know that when I saw those pics, I never thought for a moment that you were lazy
. Not for a second. Skin issues can be so flippin' mysterious and vets can offer little solution until they know what they're dealing with...meanwhile, while you're trying to 'fix' him, they continue to itch and lose fur and be symptomatic. So don't worry, a lot of us do understand that his condition could get that way with a very on-top-of-it Momma.
You're right though, it's so odd that he has these allergies so young! That's definitely an anomaly...I'm sure that threw the vet off as well...was he surprised to arrive at that conclusion?
Btw, have you thought about Atopica (generic is cyclosporine)? It's a pretty amazing med for many allergy dogs. My Marcel is on it and it was a miracle for him bc of the pollens that irritate him. It's preventive, rather than a symptom med. It doesn't work for every dog, but works beautifully for many. I don't know if it's available where you are, but I'd think it would be as it's quite common.