The antibiotics are taking their sweet time kicking in and doing something about the bronchial infection. Consequently, we've had a rough couple of days. Bella seemed back to her old self Wednesday morning and afternoon. She wanted to play fetch. She tore apart a couple of foam balls. She played bone-chase with Bailey (a "game" where one of them gets a bone, chews on it for awhile while the other dog sits watching and whining, drops it, lets the other dog get it, runs into another room with the other dog now holding the bone, and switch places in the game). She was even eating normally, but Wednesday night she went back to her space cadet routine. Yesterday that routine continued most of the day. I couldn't even get her to eat until around 2 p.m. Last night she seemed better, but today she's acting strange again. It's now 2:38 p.m., and I still can't get her to eat anything. I even made tacos for lunch, hoping I could at least get a little turkey burger into her before I gave her her meds, but she wouldn't touch it. She just sat in her hiding place--the corner where my sofa and love seat meet--hunched over, shaking, and breathing weirdly.
I guess what I thought was her not being able to breathe due to an allergic reaction is really her not being able to breathe from her bronchial tubes being stopped up, the enlarged heart, or both. When she's having the episodes, she won't even let me touch her. If I try to pick her up or touch any area of her body close to her lungs, she either screams like I'm killing her or tries to take my hand off. I hate it because I can't even comfort her without hurting her more.
To make matters worse, she now gives out going up just four of my stairs. By the time she gets to the top floor, she is panting like she just ran the Ironman Triathlon. I try to carry her as much as possible, but like I said in the previous paragraph, if she's having an episode, carrying her seems to do more harm than good, as it is further restricting her lungs.
Does anyone know how long it usually takes antibiotics to kick in? She's on a pretty strong one--SMZ-TMP. She has been on it since Tuesday night. I haven't taken an antibiotic in so long, I can't remember. These antibiotics need to kick in soon because I don't know how much more either one of us can take.
Another question for those of you who have had bronchitis, pneumonia, or some other kind of chest infection before. What helped you more--a vaporizer, a humidifier, a fan, or some combination thereof? I have all three. I want to know which, if any, of them would help to open up her airways while we're waiting for the antibiotics to do their work.
I bought some allergy carpet cleaner that's supposed to do something to allergens--kill, repel, something. If it ever stops thundering today, I'm going to try to clean, vacuum, steam, and dust everything in sight to see if it helps her at all. As my regular readers know, the dog is allergic to pretty much the whole world so I don't want swollen sinuses further restricting her breathing.
If anyone knows anything else I might can try, please let me know in the comments. I hate seeing her like this.
I'll try to find a meme or something more funny or witty to write about tomorrow. I'm just too tired from taking care of Bella to do it today. Plus, three days of thunderstorms have done a number on my sinuses. To say I miss the sun is an understatement.
