Progress Report

The good news is Mick is like a whole new dog. Happy, active, hungry, playing, Mick is back. Last I wrote putting him out of his misery was becoming more and more a valid concern.

Good advice from friends in the rescue community encouraged me to explore the possibility of tick borne illness. Thanking God for those friends. From everything I read tick borne illnesses (TBI) are very difficult to diagnose in humans and animals. They have mysterious symptoms and there are many variables. Mick was favoring one leg, not eating, in obvious pain. Sometimes severe joint pain is associated with TBI as well as neck pain. All I knew was he hurt and nothing we were doing was making any progress.

I approached the antibiotics used to treat TBI as a shot in the dark. Frankly I had nothing to lose by trying them. Amazingly he began a swift turn around for about a week, and then began to lose ground again. We adjusted his meds and he improved, but was not great. I can think of three evenings I sat with him on the recliner and though I just can't let him suffer like this anymore. Further dialog with people with experience with TBI pointed me to adding a second antibiotic to his regimen. Again, just what Mick needed.

The amount he improved boggles the mind. Today we went for our first walk since the beginning of the year. I think he set a record for the number of times he stopped to mark something. Hansel and Gretel could not have left a better trail than Mick did. Not that I'm complaining. He can stop and pee as many times as he wants. He's much much better and that's all good in my book.