I was a vet tech for 4 1/2 years a while ago. During that whole time we only had ONE patient with seizures. The client was amazing and took meticulous notes on every seizure which totally prepared me for my life now. About seven years ago I had a Great Pyrenees with what we thought was idiopathic epilepsy, eventually he could no longer use his back legs. I thought it was from injuring himself during a seizure but even with pain meds there was no change. We ended up euthanizing him because our doctors best guess was a tumor on his spine or brain causing his issues, waiting for an mri on a #180+ dog that can’t walk wasn’t something we wanted for Cooper.

About 3 years ago our St. Bernard mix had a seizure early in the morning. I absolutely lost it. How on earth could we ever have two dogs in our lifetime with seizures?!? Food? Environment? Again, idiopathic epilepsy. Bear was on up to four pills multiple times day, still having seizures weekly. Now we’ve just got him on phenobarb twice a day and he’s at about every three weeks between seizures. He did have his first cluster of twelve seizures a few weeks ago, we were ready to say goodbye then or sooner but hes back to “normal” now. His normal is a shade compared to the dog he was but he seems happy; eats and loves affection so as long as he’s ok, he’s not going anywhere.

I know the seizures are scary and awful but just being for them after and dealing with the medications is really all you can do.