Mr. Demento

If it's not one thing, it's another. Now it's poor Sparks.

Our little old guy has been off for the past many months. Heavy panting when it's not warm, walking in circles, walks into corners or furniture and then just stands there, like he's not sure where he is, and the bathroom issues. Lots of bathroom issues. It was just peeing, but he used to have an occasional accident. Now it's daily. Usually two or three times. And the poopin'. That's not so bad yet, but he never, ever would poop in the house (except that one time when we were gone all day and I mean allllll day - poor guy couldn't hold it anymore - that was our fault.) And we just had our carpets cleaned. I thought that would help - with all the smells gone.

Nope.

And the carpet guy said to stop using the Oxy rug stuff - that just makes it worse. Just use vinegar and water, which I have been doing and it does work terrific. Thank god for that.

At first we attributed his walking into stuff and then just standing there to his cataracts. But the heavy panting and the bathroom problems; Special K knew it had to be something else. She came up with dementia. So we looked it up. Seems right on target. And we found that other things that hadn't occurred to us now makes sense, like him not greeting us like he used to when we come home. Sure, he's still right there at the door but he runs past and up and down the hallway without jumping up on us like he used to. And the sleeplessness. I wake up almost nightly to his heavy panting and him wandering around the house. He used to sleep the night through.

There are some homeopathic things we found on-line that we're going to try. If we don't see marked improvement over the next two weeks, we found a new vet on-line that we'd like to try. He's way up in Monroe, but the reviews for him on yelp are freaking fantastic, and he's open on Saturdays, so we can visit Mr T at the same time.

It's kinda funny - one of the "remedies" is that we get him a t-shirt or a Thundershirt or an anxiety shirt (last two are pretty pricy; we're gonna try the t-shirt first). This will supposedly calm his anxiety and help with the panting and the feeling of listlessness. What I find funny is that I never wanted to dress him up in "human" clothes. I think folks who dress their animal companions up in sweaters and coats and costumes are just plain silly. So now I have to be "silly" and put one on. His Uncle M sent him three really cute t-shirts years ago that we have sitting in a drawer (cuz I always refused to put them on him), so we're going to try one of those to see if it helps.

Damn. I cannot lose the Sparkster just yet. Not ready. I know it's coming, but I'm not ready. Not this year.

Please.