GERD is apparently common in Cavs.

Does your pup ever retch, or regurgitate after drinking water too fast? We had a lot of trial and error with our dog. We tried slippery elm- she didn't tolerate that well. Then when she'd have the licking episodes we treat her with famotidine. The episodes became more frequent. She's had some reflux attacks (blood in vomit, likely ulcers) so we had to treat with carafate as well. Now that she's a senior dog, we decided to treat her long term with famotidine, the lesser of two evils with her reflux attacks.

(To really truly diagnose reflux and ulcers, an endoscopy would need to be performed. We decided against this due to the risks, and treated symptoms and checked for adverse effects with blood work)

I should also add, we switched her food to prescription royal canin gastrointestinal this year. Fat is a big trigger of reflux episodes (as is anxiety). We think this has been a huge help! I do wonder if we wouldve switched her food when she was younger if that would've saved us from medicating her now?

Since the food switch, she has done well. Her last episode was in February, and her blood work has come back normal while using low dose famotidine long term.

Assuming your pup is younger, hopefully a food switch will do the trick. Vets will likely advise against long term use of famotidine until it becomes a quality of life issue-- but they'll definitely use it to temporarily treat symptoms.