Around 11:30 PM on June 7th, Starbuck had a seizure. We think.
She was stumbling around, unable to keep her balance and it looked a lot like how Goofy would act when he was recovering from one of his huge seizures. But that was it - she didn't seem to have the full generalized seizure itself.
To be safe, we rushed her to the emergency vet. She was, of course, acting completely fine by the time we got there. They checked her out, told us it was likely a seizure and that shepherds were prone to epilepsy, gave us some seizure info, and sent us on our way.
Wait, what?
I generally adopt mutts from shelters, so I don't do a lot of breed research. I had no idea that adopting a shepherd mix would result in an increased chance of epilepsy:
Although any dog can have a seizure, idiopathic epilepsy is more common in border collies, Australian shepherds, Labrador retrievers, beagles, Belgian Tervurens, collies, and German shepherds.Well, crap. Also, since Goofy was a border collie/black lab mix, I guess we shouldn't have been surprised that he developed seizures as well, though his began later in life.
They told us that dogs usually have a pattern with their seizures, so we needed to watch Bucky and record when they happened. We brought her home and held our breath for the rest of the night. And the next day. And the next.
When a week had gone by without more seizure activity, we relaxed a bit. But not too much. Then another week was clear. And the third week passed without incident. We're finally back to almost breathing normally.
I know we're not in the clear, but going weeks without a recurrence is a good sign. It's tough: she's the baby! She's not supposed to be developing health issues at just under three years old! Logically I know bad stuff can happen at any time, but emotionally it packs a harder punch when it's the youngest.
