I'm starting to worry about my dog..acting up?

15 years ago

So I've heard many dogs during old age can get same diseases as humans get, so whenever I think about my 8/9 year old dog Sophie, who is a weimaraner.

She's the best dog I have out of the two that I do own. (The other cannot be trained no matter how many places we go to, but that's besides the point)

So she's the most gentle, caring, happy dog I know.

Many of my friends who love their dogs, also thing she's like a well-mannered royalty.

So for the past three days, she's been acting slightly..uh different?

Just a couple minutes ago, which made me decide to find a site that may help me out with my problem, she dug through my dads coat pocket, which was hanging on a chair momentarily, and grabbed a packet of mints out of it, right infront of all of us! A few minutes earlier she was sniffing around the kitchen looking for food.

Now you'll probably say she's hungry, but for a fact we had just fed her her dinner. Which is 4 whole cups of food. Considering that's a little more then the vet recommended (around half cup more) we know she can't possible be starving.

She's also tried to avoid going outside to the bathroom, which I can understand, there's a lot of snow, but we do have a caged in area that they go outside to take care of business in, which is nice and snow free currently.

When she tried chewing up her bed the other day, my mother said go to the basement, which she usually obeys, she just sat there looking at my mom, but not really responding. We send the dogs to the basement when their bad, it's not a bad basement, there's two dog beds, and it's nice and clean, so it's not a dungeon or anything :P

Anyways, my dad being the 'master' towards the dog, when he was telling her to come to him, not going to yell at her, because for some reason she was already shaking like he did? She sat there for 10 minutes just looking at him, well he motioned in many different ways to come.

Once she did, he wasn't mean at all, but she still had that blank look?

I'm really worried something might be wrong with her...help please!

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Comments (6)

Meghane
15 years ago
There could be a number of different things, but my first concern is about what is making her eat things she shouldn't. If she is more hungry than normal, she could have Cushing's disease (she's not on steroids for any reason, right?) which is an overproduction of glucocorticoids and the results are increased hunger, thirst, and urination among other things. She could be hungry because her body demands extra nutrition due to chronic disease- cancer, liver disease, heart disease, kidney disease, other. She could be getting senile and forgetting her training and not obeying because of that, eating things she shouldn't.

She may not be able to hear as well, causing her non-responsiveness. Older dogs often lose their hearing gradually, but sometimes they compensate until they are almost completely deaf.

There are certainly many reasons that she could be exhibiting any of those symptoms. I would strongly recommend a physical exam and complete blood work- CBC, chemistry profile, UA- to help narrow down what is going on. While bloodwork may not be able to pinpoint exactly the cause of her problems, it may suggest certain conditions, but more importantly in can rule out failure of major organs.

Noticing these changes is very important, and you should definitely bring this up to your vet.
mazer415
15 years ago
I agree with Meghane in that you need to get her to the vet to rule out ANY physical problems (one should ALWAYS start there) next I would consider her diet, dont feed her all at once, but a couple of feedings during the day. Once in the morning and again in the late afternoon...hopefully you are feeding her a quality dog food.
You need to know that dogs ARE influenced by each others behavior and you might want to rethink training for the other dog....hope all is okay, I hope you repost to let us know.
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iemma
Original Author
15 years ago
We feed her twice a day like the vet recommended.
She's not deaf, she'll look at wear the sound is coming from, but won't respond, like she's ignoring us, or trying to.

The other dog actually calmed her anxiety, she's a jealous dog, that can be sneaky though, which I forgot to inform you guys about (sorry, i was sort of panicking.) When she was a puppy we couldn't leave her a cage, that was around x5's bigger then her in the first place, because she had anxiety issues and would scratch her head against the side until it bled. So we got her a brother, and everything changed and she's really nice now. But Chester, Sophies "brother", is a soft-coated wheaten terrier, we've already took him to around 4 different trainers, I guess it's just his instincts preventing him changing into a nicer, calmer, relaxed, less dirty dog. ( We wash/groom him, but he loves going outdoors..so.ha.)

And yes, we are feeding her a quality dog food that you can only buy at certain pet stores, not PetCo/PetSmart.

Do they do blood work when dogs go into surgery? I know it may sound silly, but I'm sure if she's already gotten blood work done for all that.

She had surgery earlier this summer for skin-tags, and cracked teeth, in multiple areas for the skin-tags.

I really hope it's nothing more then old age, if there's cancer, It would really crush me. She's one of the prettiest weimaraners ever, well, not to be conceited, but she really is a pretty one.

Oh, and she's kind of getting more paranoid in a sense. Getting scared really easily, I don't know why! We treat our dogs with respect like their our family, which they are, and there's no pet-abuse in the family either. (Never ever ever will that happen!)
pkguy
15 years ago
I also think you'd better get her in for an exam and some blood work. There could be significant changes since the last blood tests were done earlier in the summer.
runsnwalken
15 years ago
what do you feed? Most dog food its good for dogs, and has awful things in it.

Innova EVO/Orijen is good.
housefairy
15 years ago
As others suggested you need to have her checked by a vet.

You said she could hear, but is she having problems seeing? Your vet should be able to answer this question.

I would think she's too young for senility, but I would question the vet. Also, there is vestibular (old dog) disease that affects their vertigo. She may not want to go outside or down in the basement because she's not sure on her feet.

Make a list of questions you will want to ask of your vet. That way you won't forget when you're dealing with your dog's anxieties.