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Hello, first let me say a little about myself....I currently have two dogs both are golden retriever/chow mixes. Koda and Kaia. We have just recently (a week ago) been told that Kaia has been diagnosed with grade 3 luxating patellas in both of her back knees.
We are having problems with Kaia again. This poor dog is just riddled with problems. She was just recently diagnosed with a very rare genetic disorder called Pituitary Dwarfism. Basically her pituitary gland is not producing the right hormones to help her grow and thrive correctly but in doing so, it is creating more problems. She is about 6 months old physically but she has been since I have gotten her in February. We honestly have no idea how old she really is. She is definitely well over a year but she can be any age. Her teeth are not growing and her fur will not change and she will not get any bigger and she is mentally always going to be 6 months old. She is an EXTREMELY destructive chewer. She has shredded pop cans and hard plastic toys(literally into over 100 pieces), she has destroyed kongs and lately she has started eating my porch. The problem is, mentally she isn't learning not to do it. She will get it while I am outside with her and correct her but within just a short time she just forgets. That is unfortunately never going to change.
We are going to have a thyroid test done on her, if she does not have enough of the thyroid hormone she can develop pituitary tumors. She may have to be on thyroid meds for the rest of her life. That is where our big problem lies. She needs to have growth hormone to ever get her out of this state and that is not a guarentee just a possibility that it will help her. It is somewhere between $100-$300 a month for the rest of her life. There is absolutely no way I can afford that. We are putting off the $1500 knee surgery that she needs until we decide what to do. We do not want to put her to sleep but we cannot afford to fix her and I know that she will be in pain soon. More then she is now (due to her knees). I am waiting for a call back from our orthopedic surgeon to see what he thinks are our best solution. I am so frustrated.
My hubby has kind of liked all of the pets we have had but he is not really a dog person but for some reason he has developed a very strong bond to Kaia and this is killing him. I don't know what to do.
What would you do if you were in my shoes?
(By the way, this is a very nice forum!)
We are having problems with Kaia again. This poor dog is just riddled with problems. She was just recently diagnosed with a very rare genetic disorder called Pituitary Dwarfism. Basically her pituitary gland is not producing the right hormones to help her grow and thrive correctly but in doing so, it is creating more problems. She is about 6 months old physically but she has been since I have gotten her in February. We honestly have no idea how old she really is. She is definitely well over a year but she can be any age. Her teeth are not growing and her fur will not change and she will not get any bigger and she is mentally always going to be 6 months old. She is an EXTREMELY destructive chewer. She has shredded pop cans and hard plastic toys(literally into over 100 pieces), she has destroyed kongs and lately she has started eating my porch. The problem is, mentally she isn't learning not to do it. She will get it while I am outside with her and correct her but within just a short time she just forgets. That is unfortunately never going to change.
We are going to have a thyroid test done on her, if she does not have enough of the thyroid hormone she can develop pituitary tumors. She may have to be on thyroid meds for the rest of her life. That is where our big problem lies. She needs to have growth hormone to ever get her out of this state and that is not a guarentee just a possibility that it will help her. It is somewhere between $100-$300 a month for the rest of her life. There is absolutely no way I can afford that. We are putting off the $1500 knee surgery that she needs until we decide what to do. We do not want to put her to sleep but we cannot afford to fix her and I know that she will be in pain soon. More then she is now (due to her knees). I am waiting for a call back from our orthopedic surgeon to see what he thinks are our best solution. I am so frustrated.
My hubby has kind of liked all of the pets we have had but he is not really a dog person but for some reason he has developed a very strong bond to Kaia and this is killing him. I don't know what to do.What would you do if you were in my shoes?
(By the way, this is a very nice forum!)
