Oh Jade......please get better.

I cant believe how quickly it came on. One minute Jade and I were out for our walk and she seemed perfectly okay, even galloping back to Colin's front door,  and then within 2 hours of our return Jade had collapsed.  She had devoured her dinner, we had finished ours and, as we settled in front of the TV to watch a movie at our sons in Milton Keynes, she started shaking uncontrollably, panting and, as she tried to get up, fell heavily onto her right side. We got her outside where she messed and started circling clockwise in a most distressing manor. Getting her back into the house was a nightmare as she seemed to loose coordination and had no idea where she was. Eventually between the three of us, (Colin, Ian and myself) we managed to guide her back in, laid her down onto her bed and stood helpless as she shook and started licking her lips. Looking into her eyes you could see them moving rapidly from side to side and because of the lip licking assumed she must be feeling nauseous.  Immediately we rang the vets. Unfortunately they told us that if it had been a stroke we had apparently left it to long for them to intervene. Apparently there is a time limit where treatment must commence to made any difference. So the only suggestion was to keep her calm and quiet and see how she was in the morning.

 That night Ian choose to sleep downstairs on the sofa not wanting to leave her on her own!

Yesterday morning I was downstairs early. Ian said she had a fairly restful night so both of us got her outside for her hurry ups. She was still very disorientated but the circling had improved marginally. We made the decision not to stay at our sons any longer or go down south to see Ian's sister and brother but head back to our vets in Eastwood near to Langley Mill. It being Sunday they were closed but a phone message gave us the 'out of hours' number for a vet in Nottingham. We took the address and directions and then the girl on the other end started to explain the cost. Cost was the least of our concerns especially as Jade was insured but that all changed when she said it would be £125 just to walk through the door, then with the consult and drugs it could go as high as £200, to make matters worse, there would also be a £12 admin charge to process the insurance claim! I was horrified. How do they justify that sort of charging. Well I put the phone down, told Ian, and then decided to phone our daughter Christine who is a veterinary nurse to see what she thought. She was equally horrified and then said why dont we bring her to her vets in Swadlincote. It was open 7 days a week and they never charge any more for a weekend consultation as they do during the week. So with a 20 mile detour we arrived in time for the appointment. The vet Kevin also couldn't rule out a stroke but thought that maybe the antibiotics given to Jade by the Eastwood vets hadn't been prescribed for long enough and the middle ear infection may have returned. So that's where we are at now. Today she struggled to get up and refused her breakfast although the tablets went down well, smothered in pate. So now we have more antibiotic tablets, different from the previous lot but this time a 2 week course, and all we can do is hope she starts to improve soon because the other alternative doesn't bare thinking about.

Jade returning from our walk Saturday afternoon. No sign of what was to come