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PVC Dog Support Cart (n where I've been all month)

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A rolling support for my 65lb., almost 14-year-old border collie, Indiana, after he had two convulsive seizures and the vet over-reacted and nearly poisoned him with four powerful prescription medications beyond what he actually needed. (Prednisone, Omeprazole, Metronidazol, and Tramadol. Prednisone and Tramadol because the vet assumed the seizure was caused by a tumor, and yet explained why it would be impossible for us to do any tests to definitively verify that diagnosis, and the other two meds to combat known negative effects of the Prednisone like causing ulcers which in turn can cause infection.) Now that I've weened him off of those four, he's walking on his own again (and fully over that terrifying diarrhea that even scared the vet!) and no longer needs this cart. :happybounce: He still can't get up on his own, though, but that's a side-effect of the one medication that he's still on but certainly still needs: Phenobarbital, which prevents more seizures; it makes him chronically sleepy and dizzy.  :cry: (UPDATE 2017: Avoid using Phenobarbital in dogs if AT ALL possible!!!! That shit COMMONLY destroys their livers in LESS THAN A YEAR! Vets get away prescribing it because they don't expect dog owners to keep their seizure dogs alive much longer than that! :rage:)

We believe the seizures were primarily caused by the Imrab-3 Rabies Vaccine, which, by law, the State of Arizona forced us to give him just 3.5 months prior to him developing the seizures. At that time, the vet swore to us that the Imrab-3 was one of the "perfectly safe" versions of the rabies vaccine. AFTER Indiana had two spectacular seizures, the office admitted that Imrab-3 has a 5% chance of causing such seizures.

Presumably, they meant in general across dogs of all ages; the true probability is probably far greater in dogs of Indiana's admirable age. But there are no age-based exemptions to the rabies vaccination law. We checked, and we even besieged the vet herself for a signature on a document that would have said the risk was too high for a senior dog and thereby the vaccine could not have been administered to Indiana in good conscience. She refused on account that no such clause actually exists. I don't believe she really knew whether it did or did not, but answered us based on her obvious faith in traditional medicine and unwillingness to research/question minutia of the law for herself.

As my mom pointed out, another and far more ill-boding way of phrasing "5%" is: one out of every twenty. There were at least 20 other dogs in line for the vaccine ahead of us..... I hope they were all more lucky; Indiana was just lucky he had an owner willing to fight for him instead of taking the easy way out when his "cherry espresso" colored shit hit the fan: euthanasia. "He's old anyway" and "He's lived a good life" are NOT legitimate medical conditions, they're excuses to trash-bin a loyal friend for selfish reasons.....

Secondarily, my mom and I researched Indiana's diet after he had the seizures, and found out that he could also have been severely deficient in Magnesium, which is basically the nutrient that makes up the connections between neurons. Too little magnesium in one's body, and your brain cells will loose their ability to send signals to one another, leading to seizures and other neurological effects similar to short-circuiting and BSODs. ("Blue Screens of Death" the classic meltdown of Windows systems.) Even while on his full dose of Phenobarbital, a widely-used and credible seizure suppressant, Indiana was still having Petite Mal seizures (staring into space as if under hypnosis, unresponsive, sleeping with eyes open, etc....) Once I started him on Magnesium supplements of my own volition, without consulting a vet, those lesser seizures went away as well! :la: Watching him like a very, very, very hungry hawk 24 hours a day seven days a week (except for the times I collapsed from exhaustion for a few hours every two or three days) I very, very gradually upped his dose to 62mg every six hours (which according to the internet is about four times the recommended daily dose for a dog of his weight) and that seems to do the trick keeping him lucid. :phew:

I don't think these two possible causes are unconnected, however. At the moment, my source is just hearsay, but that hearsay says that Magnesium supplements are what one is supposed to take in order to flush Mercury out of one's body, like how (at least in popular Sci-Fi) one is supposed to take Iodine in order to flush out radioactive material. (Mercury is in most vaccines, but in forms that go by different, less commonly recognized names, like how Sugar goes by a zillion different names in everyday junk food.) Based on that, and my mom's observation, through internet research, that the side-effects of vaccines very closely resemble the signs of severe Magnesium deficiency, I wonder if the process works both ways: taking Magnesium flushes Mercury, and taking Mercury displaces Magnesium, essentially punching holes (where Magnesium should remain) in a person or animal's brain at the cellular level....

I can't possibly argue any of this with a veterinarian. All the ones I'll ever meet at normal office visits with my pets don't work in research; it is basically malpractice for normal office vets and doctors to use creative reasoning, as I have just done above as a lay person. Their job is strictly to cite established, formally approved healthcare methods; introducing anything new to the world of medicine outside of a formal research initiative would basically be going maverick, with a criminal stigma....

I also wonder if the real reason large dogs have shorter life-expectancies than small ones is simply because they're too big for normal human beings to take care of when they eventually get sick. Border collies are considered medium-sized dogs, and that has been difficult enough. Had he been 100lbs. instead of 65lbs., I wouldn't have been physically capable of keeping him on his feet for those three weeks that he was in critical condition, and he'd have atrophied, and as a result have gotten sicker in new ways all related to being bedridden.

That in mind, I hope this simplistic design (two harnesses suspend dog's torso and hindquarters from each end of the center pole across the top) can help other people save their medium/large dogs' lives by enabling them to keep going on walks though their neighborhoods, even if not around the house since it's too bulky. There are actually professionally made, much stronger and more discrete dog walkers available that will work indoors, but from what I saw they were $500+ apiece for the size we needed, and I doubted could be shipped to us quickly enough. At the time, Indiana was in critical condition and I was counting every daily task in seconds....

In particular, I was putting into practice the famous actor Dick Van Dyke's advice: "The secret to keeping moving is keeping moving!" Regarding that, I highly recommend everybody who is either old or planning on getting old watch this Van Dyke interview with Conan O'brian. That guy (Van Dyke, not Conan. Sorry, Conan. :XD:) is one of my personal heroes. :D Oh, and btw, he does, and loves, even at his age, 3D modeling and animation! :wow: :la:

Had I actually finished building this cart before Indiana recovered enough to walk without it, and he actually gotten to use it, I would have put a cardboard cutout of Woodstock from the Charlie Brown cartoons on top of it! :D No reason healthcare (or "hospice care" as Indiana's vet started calling it when she finally understood NOTHING she could say would make me put him down) needs to be all stoicism and creative sterility... :bleh:

My own grandfather survived on freaking dialysis for over 30 years, and he always said his secret, aside from "being your own quarterback" (double-checking and even second-guessing your doctors), was to laugh though hard times. He was a wonderful joker; towards the end of his life, he lost several toes, and all he would say to me is that he wanted to go to a beach just to leave a trail of strange looking footprints that would puzzle people. ...I miss him. TT^TT He must have known what he was talking about, because at the time he finally died, the doctors had no idea which of the seven fatal conditions and innumerable lesser ones he'd been living with for decades to put down on his death certificate. Long before he did die, they had even admitted no one could explain why he was still alive with all of those conditions....

So, keep moving, don't assume doctors are infallible, and laugh-off what ails ya; because if you don't have fighting spirit, as me and my dog did, nothing in the world can save you....
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owh2005's avatar
Update on Kancha, he is now walking on his paw, still on his wrist but on his paw more than not.  And the chiropractor we take him to has a patient that their dog just had a stroke and is going to use our cart design (yours) in hopes of helping their dog.  You never know how many people you can help by sharing ideas - thanks again.