Dogs on Drugs: Chlomipramine Decision
Earlier, I shared some new dog behaviors that cropped up after we dropped Lilly’s evening dose of chlomipramine. Others of more concern began to worsen as the levels of meds in her system dropped for real after 6 weeks on a lower dose. So … we’ve decided …
To put Lilly back on a full dose — 75 mg twice a day.
I simply cannot have her feeling awful just because I wish she could be on a lower dose or (some day) off meds entirely for her anxiety.
Over recent weeks, we’ve seen signs that Lilly suffered growing anxiety even in daily life. These include:
- Hiding
- Running from us
- Cowering on approach
- Off-the-charts snarking toward Ginko
Her reactions toward Ginko — who truly was doing NOTHING — is most worrisome to me. He is getting older and his patience runs thin sometimes. It isn’t fair for her to be so crabby toward him.
And, I mean full-on teeth-baring, growling, and occasional snapping at him. She does it most often in a resource-guarding scenario … where she is trying to control his access to me or Tom (or a certain room).
At some point, he is going to retaliate … I fear.
I even found Ginko trapped in the back bathroom. Lilly had driven him across the house and into the bathroom, then would NOT let him out. I heard him crying, and I couldn’t figure out what was wrong until I found him trapped.
That’s not OK.
In addition to going back to a full dose, I’ll be redoubling my efforts to make sure Lilly gets enough exercise and does at least a little training and / or behavior modification work each day.
This is a discouraging turn of events, but if Lilly needs the meds to feel OK, then she needs them. I don’t feel bad about Ginko needing thyroid meds twice a day, and I shouldn’t feel icky about Lilly needing her brain chemistry meds either. Right? Right!
