Rough Start

So we had a rough start to our Monday this week. As if Monday's aren't hard enough when the alarm goes off we (really Matti) decided to make this a Monday we won't soon forget. For those of you who have been in our lives since Matti joined my world almost two years ago you know that we have had our fair share of health concerns. The most reoccurring problem we have are allergies. Life would be grand if we could figure out what those allergies are but we tend to learn the hard way.

Whenever Matti has had an allergic reaction one of her eyes will usually start swelling up. With each reaction it has gotten a little worse but this Sunday we made a HUGE jump in the severity of the swelling. I came home from watching the SuperBowl with friends only to find a slight swollen eyed Matti. I gave her some benadryl and headed off to bed. I set my alarm for midnight to wake up and check on her. At midnight the swelling was a little worse but I wasn't too worried.

This is the midnight shot. Doesn't she look pitiful?

I went back to bed and reset the alarm. At 3am I wake up with Matti on top of me working overtime to wake me up. I honestly thought it must be morning and time for us to get up when I realized it was still really dark. I looked at the clock and could tell Matti was having trouble breathing....more so than normal for a smashed nose boxer. I put my hand on her face and could feel the swelling had gotten really bad. I was dreading turning on the light. When I got up this is what I found...

the Matti from midnight had now affectionately become "Bruiser" at 3am. Her eyes were almost completely swollen shut, her muzzle was beet red and she was struggling to breath. I very calmly gave her an epi shot to make sure her airway didn't close. The vet had given me this for a "worse case scenario" allergy and I quickly assessed this was IT! After an hour she wasn't getting any better so off to the doggy ER we went.

Many of you just saw $$$$ signs flash before you eyes didn't you? Yeah, me too! I couldn't let my baby suffer and I didn't know if we could wait it out until our vet opened at 8am. After a 4am visit to the vet, an IV of steroids and another shot we were on our way back home. The vet told me to continue giving her 75mg (3 capsules) of benadryl every 8 hours for the next 24 hours. I had one drunk pup on my hands.

We didn't get off that easy though. Before leaving the animal ER I found out that Matti has a heart murmur. This explains so many things about her behavior for a long time. For example she gets incredibly winded when playing with other dogs and take a long time to cool down. Poor girl! We will just have to continue to monitor the situation and pray it doesn't get worse. I am banking on lots and lots of good years with my Matti!