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Before I go into detail, I do realize that there's another recent thread about seizure, but that pet is no longer with us. I didn't want to add to it as the focus of that discussion has clearly shifted. If you're reading here, I'm very sorry to hear of your decision, but completely understand.
I woke up at 6AM to the sounds of one of my standard poodles doing what looked like back flips ... standing on his rear legs, then flopping over on his back, twisting around, and doing it again. I jumped out of bed and tried to help him to lay on his side so that he would stop doing involuntary gymnastics around the bedroom, which was no easy feat.
The entire episode lasted about 4-5 minutes. I eventually held him down and had him laying on his side (he's strong), and I calmed him.
I've been reading about seizures to try to understand what happened. Symptoms that I'm seeing are running around and into things, or twitching in place. I didn't see anything about back flips.
Part of me can't even believe it actually happened because I was barely awake and definitely confused. At times I thought he was in death throes. After he was calm, the dogs went out for a run. I kept an eye on him and he's had no similar symptoms since.
For anyone who knows about seizures in dogs, or standard poodles, have you heard of anything like this before? Is it by any chance some sort of progressive illness that I'm dealing with?
Hey guys, I'm having flashbacks of thrashing around on the floor with a 70 pound back flipping dog while still half in a dream.
A little help here?
I can't even say if it was real anymore because I was just with my dogs when it happened.
Can a seizure effect rear limbs, or lower back, alone?
It's here in name, but no one on this website cares about dog seizures?
Outstanding!
I just got here! Maybe it's just a slow day - I know there are other posters who have dogs who seize.
Anyway, I've had four dogs who had seizures (one currently) and they all did the classic flop on their side, salivate, paddle, thrash, vocalize thing. None of them lost control of their bowels, thankfully. No back flips with mine, yet.
However, I do know of an Australian Shepard in my neighborhood who did do back flips as you describe. She was on phenobarbital for several years and her seizures were successfully controlled. Until they weren't. She had too many too close together (cluster seizures) and went into status epilepticus so they had to put her down at that point.
I'd check in with your vet tomorrow. At the very least, the vet will get some baseline blood work and will determine if there's anything going on besides a "simple" seizure. It's a complicated subject and I'm not a vet so I don't want to offer too much advice.
Here's a link to a very comprehensive site. There's lots to learn.
What your dog displayed isn't close to what my Carly did. She did the paddling, gum chewing, salivating and all. Start journaling your dog's daily activity, that will help your vet if it happens again. Also, if it does happen again grab your phone, go into video mode and record it, your vet will have a better idea of what's going on that way as well.
Thanks for the feedback! He seems totally normal again today. Maybe he was just being a drama queen and wanted my attention so he could go outside ... kidding.
That's a very good thing. But if it happens again, I'd certainly have him checked out. Such relatively simple things like a thyroid issue or hypoglycemia can cause seizures. It's not necessarily caused by anything catastrophic but something else that needs to be addressed. Each of my dogs who had seizures could go months between seizures. With my current dog, her first signs were merely sudden "startle" behavior accompanied by staring into space. It would only last a few seconds and not recur for maybe six months or more. But over several years, these episodes became more frequent and then out of the blue she had a grand mal seizure. So you just never know. Let's hope this was an isolated incident.
I will - thank you. His dad had kidney failure at roughly the same age.
I've wondered if he had a bug in his ear ... after all the wrestling I noticed a small bug bite on my arm. He has a supper short summer clip, so there's not too many places for a bug to hide, but it is conceivable that one found its way to his ear.
I believe my dog had a seizure this weekend. He was fine one moment, and then the next he wasn't. Unfortunately, none of us witnessed anything - it was early morning and my husband had fed the dog and let him outside for his morning constitution. A few minutes later, my son was heading downstairs and alerted me to the fact the dog had pooped in the foyer. It was normal, not diarrhea. When I came downstairs a few moments after my son, I saw that my dog was flopped on the floor, and his back end was non-functional. He was also definitely "out of it" as far as mental status.
My husband and I rushed him to the emergency vet, who did bloodwork and didn't notice anything of real concern other than mildly raised liver enzymes. The vet put the dog on fluids and gave him a steroid shot. We left him there for 4 hours and when we came back he was walking again, but still acting strange. He is my velcro dog and when i picked him up from the emergency vet it was as though I was a stranger to him. But when he saw my HUSBAND upon arriving home, he velcro'd to my husband. For the next two days he was nervous, scared, shy, whiny, food guarded and yet barely ate. He kept going to my husband for reassurance. We felt so bad for him because he clearly didn't understand what had happened to him.
For the next 48 hours we kept a close eye on him for a return to normalcy, and it wasn't until after 48 hours that my dog finally returned to his normal velcro behavior with me and was back to being a happy, active dog.
He's going to his regular vet in a few weeks, and I'm loathe to put the dog on phenobarbital because it can cause aggression. My dog already experiences fear aggression (which I very carefully manage at all times), and do not want that to be exacerbated by meds. So we're on a wait and see over the next few weeks - and doing a LOT of research into dog seizures and how to manage them.
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