February 12, 2011
Just when I thought the only problem was the side effects of the fentynal patch, the battle of the pills began. I think that Xanadu must have bit into a nasty antibiotic, because he went from happily eating his cream cheese balls with the magic filling to turning his nose up at them.
This wouldn’t have worried me so much if I hadn’t removed the fentynal patch a day early. I decided to remove it because it was making Xan incredibly anxious and he was whining incessantly. So much that he couldn’t sleep and if he wasn’t sleeping, his nurse wasn’t sleeping. I posted the question to my favorite Bone Cancer Dogs Yahoo Group and learned of other dogs having a similar reaction. Since he had been willingly taking his tramadol and gabapentin, I wasn’t worried about losing the this medication.
But then Xan caught on to my tricks. So at 12:00 AM, I was cooking hamburger meat. No dice. At 12:30, I made melted cheese balls. Yeah right. At 2:00 AM, I was scrambling eggs. Nope. So I resorted to the old fashioned method of forcing pills. I hate doing that. I’ve decided that dogs are the worst patients. They totally don’t “get” why you are making them eat pills and they are just big enough that forcing them really isn’t a good option (they do have teeth after all). At what point will a perfectly docile dog that is miserable bite its human mom? I hope I never find out.
Needless to say, removing the fentynal patch helped Xan (and me) have our first 4 hour stretch of sleep since he came home on 2/10. I feel so energized this morning! Although it is only 50 degrees out, Xan and I are already in the backyard, hanging out, listening to the birds and watching the squirrels play.
I’m going to buy pill pockets today (they worked in the past and it has been a few weeks since he last had them) and some other meat mixtures to try. But if anyone has a good pill trick up their sleeve, please share!