One Sick Puppy

Rudy began acting extremely well-behaved around the time that Grammy and Grandpa left on the 20th. He would walk next to us off leash and not run away even with other dogs around, and he stopped begging for food. Patrick and I had a couple conversations about how grown up Rudy was becoming. Then we began to suspect his sudden good behavior was due more to the fact that he was too sick to steal food and misbehave, than a sudden maturity of mind. We didn't suspect he was ill at first since he was still eating and drinking, and his only symptom was that he was just very subdued. The clincher was when we had dinner with Pam and Neil on our boat, and he didn't even try to steal anything!

The next morning, his illness was becoming even more apparent. We thought he was obviously in discomfort and maybe had a fever. We brought Rudy into the local vet in Loreto and found out that he had a very high fever. The vet thought that Rudy had an infection and so he gave him some shots for the fever and infection and sent us home with more antibiotics. Unfortunately, there is no laboratory available for vets in Loreto, so the vet can only use his best guess to figure out an animal's illness.

Rudy seemed to get better over the next day or two, but soon it was obvious that his fever had returned (106.7) and that he was feeling very poorly again. We returned to the vet and got more shots and more meds to take care of the diarrhea that had begun. Again, he got better, his fever went away for a day, but once again this morning it had returned.

So early this morning, we rushed in to Puerto Escondido, Patrick rented a car and he and Rudy are now driving down to La Paz to get to a veterinarian who has access to a laboratory to figure out what is really wrong with Rudy. It is a four hour drive and Patrick will have just enough time to get there and be seen. As you can imagine, we are worried sick. It is scary to be so far away from the medical care that we are used to accessing so easily.

Please say a prayer for Rudy's quick recovery.
Laura