Diary 24. Poorly Pup

Visiting The Vets in Spain

Bailey, the cheeky little monkey, has been snouting around in bushes, on beaches, and by bins the entire time we've been away. Occasionally she decides to eat something from one of these areas, and it is of course a game to her where we have to chase her to retrieve the unidentified object. We took a gamble by not buying any pet insurance to cover her, so it was only a matter of time until we discovered if that was the right choice.


The three of us have been struggling with the heat for a fair while now, as the south of Spain in June is an awful lot hotter than we anticipated. It was apparent that she wasn't feeling herself, but we weren't too worried, as we were regularly wetting her ears and paws to cool her down, and trying to make sure there was shade available for her to go and pant under.


Then she got the poops.

We weren't too worried at first, thinking it could be a result of her food changing, as we couldn't always find the same brand of biscuits. Then came the sleepless nights.


I can certainly imagine how the poor little love was feeling, that moment where the urge hits you so strong it practically thrusts you to the bathroom. Well, the world is Bailey's bathroom, but, 

1. She has to wake us up to be allowed out into the world of poo places.

2. She refuses to poo or wee within about 7 metres of the van. Her safety leash is 5 metres long.


As we were staying in such close quarters in the south of Spain, we didn't have any chance to just open the door and let her roam, we had to get up with her and walk her to a patch of grass surrounding the parking lot. 

Living In Close Quarters

3 nights in a row, we ended up doing this a minimum of 5 times a night, and her little desperate squeaks were so sad. It had it's funny points, like seeing how far it would shoot out of her and comparing our tales in the morning (we often took turns letting her out to allow for some kind of rest each).


Now, we've all had tummy bugs or eaten something a bit off and had a few days of running back and forth to the bathroom, ultimately ending up with a sore bottom. Because of this, we decided to let whatever was happening in her gut run it's course, and if she didn't get better, or she stopped being herself, we'd look at taking her to a vets.


That night she threw up an entire day's worth of undigested food.


Bailey was no longer herself in the slightest. It's hard to explain, because we have such a close relationship with her now we are in the van, it's really easy to tell that her ears are a little lower, and she smells different, and her eyes look sad. I'm sure any of you with animals, and of course children, know those subtle differences which others can't see. 

Basically, she'd had enough, gone a bit limp, and really wasn't with us. We acted straight away, looking up the nearest veterinary surgery and hurriedly packing the van away to set off before siesta.


We really lucked out with the vet we ended up going to. They saw her straight away, and even though there was a very difficult language barrier (we only knew enough Spanish to get by in shops and bars, not enough to translate medical terminology), the vet got out his iPad, brought up google translate, and we all spent the time making sure we were absolutely clear about the symptoms, and his findings as he examined her. 

Vet Translating With An iPad

We felt so at ease, but of course we had a niggle of price in the back of our minds. Surely service such as this comes at a private healthcare type premium? 

Anyway, the examination continued for another 10 or 15 minutes, where the vet told us that her temperature was fine, so it wasn't an infection. Phew! Her heart rate and birthing were fine. Phew! Her gums and under her eyes were the perfect shade of pink. Thank Goodness! Then he felt all along her belly, and listened with his stethoscope. Suddenly he looked worried.


What we didn't know and he kindly explained, is that you should always be able to hear things gurgling inside the tummy but Bailey's tummy was as silent as the night is dark. I knew that could mean an obstruction. Please lord, not an obstruction! 

A side note here, to show that it wasn't all doom and gloom, and to let you know how much I didn't want it to be an obstruction; Bailey enjoys chewing on balloons, and other such latex/rubberised materials. She also likes to eat them, from their packets, from the bin after a birthday party etc. To put it delicately, we certainly aren't trying for a baby on this trip, and so precautions are being taken. All I could think was, 

"Please don't let there be a condom in her stomach on an X-ray." 

I couldn't handle having to explain it to the vet, and not with the language barrier. I was going red at the thought of it! Anyway, enough about me, let's get back to Bailey...

The vet explained there were 2 approaches we could take. At the very very least, he wanted to prescribe her some easy digest food, and a tonic which was essentially Lucozade for dogs. At the most, he wanted to run some blood work, and test for parasites, and parasite born illnesses. 

He reassured us that her Scalibor collar should've protected her against ticks, sand flies and the diseases they transmit, but nothing is 100%. It's possible she may have Leishmaniasis, which is incurable. 

Bailey Feeling Sorry For Herself On The Examination Table

Suddenly we were very frightened that our little pooch, after all she's been through this year, might be terminally ill. The vet got his assistant to draw up an invoice for us, so he could explain each item, and we could decide what we wanted, and what we didn't. 

As the invoice was being drawn up, we looked at each other, and we looked down at Bailey. She hadn't flinched or moved or tried to jump off the table once. She was actually in a little haze, lying down calmly.

"This isn't our dog" I said to Matt, "I don't know what my upper cost limit is though." 

"We'll have to see",  he said, "I don't think we can afford a huge amount". 

In came the assistant with the dreaded bit of paper, the bit of paper which would show the vets how much or how little we loved our baby. The paper that would determine her worth to us in this world.


For the special food, Lucozade tonic, parasite infection blood panel, full blood work up, no less than 5 injections of varying merit and of course for the vet's visit..... €174. 

I can't say it didn't sting a little, but the vet had been very thorough and truthful throughout, seemed genuine and not trying to rip us off, and was himself, clearly worried about Bailey. We expect it's probably a lot less than it would cost in the UK.

I repeated to Matt "She's not right, this isn't Bailey, we can't let her carry on. Even if it turns out not to be serious, I don't think we should take the chance." 

And so we agreed, and all the bottles and needles and tests came out.


Drawing her blood was very difficult. The poor little lamb had to be jabbed twice, as she was so dehydrated that her blood was refusing to flow, and even then there was only just enough! She barely made a peep the entire time, but the next 15 minutes waiting for all the results to come back were agonising. 

The Leishmaniasis test panel (with other diseases on it too) was very much like a pregnancy test. One control line, one test line. Anyone who has taken a home pregnancy test know, whatever your hopes, waiting for the line to appear or not appear is tense. 

Well, we had to wait for the line not to appear on 4 different panels. Like I said, agonising.


Her other blood panel had come back as all clear, and we just had to let the 15 minutes on the pregnancy style test run it's course before she was out of the woods. Thankfully no positive results!! 

Now she had to be injected 5 times with a cocktail of antibiotics, immune helpers, hydrators, anti vomiting drugs and painkillers. 

Bailey's Injections

As with any antibiotics, we needed follow up treatment, but strangely not in pill form. We had to go back there 2 days later to administer the next dose. Well, that scuppered our plans a little. We were going to shoot up further along the coast, but, she's our baby, and needed looking after. Plus, it meant that if she continued to go downhill (please, not an obstruction!!) the vet had already seen her, and we were defiantly booked in should any troubles arise. If not, at least we'd be happy with a clean bill of health. 

We went back to our parking site, but decided to take ourselves off into a corner, away from the main path. It was there we met a lovely Dutch couple (more about them another time!) who helped us to laugh our time away waiting for the vets visit. 

Saturday morning came around quick as a flash - time flies when you're having fun! Bailey had begun to perk up, lapping down her Lucozade (which I also accidentally drunk one morning in a sleepy haze. What she liked about that flavour, I will never know!) so we were feeling good, and ready to get back on the road.


This time, the vet got to meet the real Bailey. Scrabbling and panting and jumping on top of our heads to get away from the vet, as usual! He didn't even need us to say that she was feeling better! 

Bailey Back To Herself

He explained that today was another general check up, her injection, and that on Monday we were to come back for her third and final injection. Wait, what? Hold on a minute, he said this was the last one. We don't want to stay here for 2 more nights, we have an entire continent to see! 

He saw our small scowl to each other, and explained what we all know about antibiotics. If the course is started, it must be finished. He knew we were travelling from our first appointment, so I thought, what the heck, and asked,

"Is it possible that we can give her last injection ourselves?" 

The worst that can happen is he says no, and we have to trudge back to the people we've just said Bon voyage to! To my astonishment, he said, 

"Si, no problem."

Result. 

Anyone reading who knows me, knows I'm not really squeamish about medical things, apart from watching people get dislocations re-set *shudder*, so it wasn't a daunting thing for me at all, I just needed to ask the proper way to inject her so not to screw up. I went to ask him to show me how, and he handed me the needle! 

Now I was nervous, it felt like a test, but he was very kind, very informative, showed me exactly how to pinch the skin and let me give her the second dose! And I'm so proud and big headed about it, because she didn't squeak at all. Mummy's touch clearly is very gentle.


He dispensed another dose into a syringe, recommended we take another supplement which was essentially Actimel for dogs to re-introduce the right microbes to her gut micro-biome after it having been completely evacuated for a week. With goody bag number two in our hands, and a very eager to leave pup, we went on our merry way, exceptionally pleased with the outcome. 

Touch wood, Bailey's digestive system actually seems to have become much better since all this too, so it's a thumbs up from me to the veterinary partner at vet place Roquetas De Mar!

J x

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