Bram
Bram is a mixed breed (?Labrador mix) who crashed into our family on August 13th 1994. Having taken on Bonnie I had started working weekends at shelter I got her from. One Saturday whilst cleaning out runs I found myself looking at Bonnie's double. My first thought was that someone had played a practical joke and put Bonnie in the run to surprise me. It turned out that Bram had had five homes (we think) and had still managed to spend most of his 2 years in the shelter.
As a result of the extended time in the shelter and the fact he'd never been trained he associated with dogs more than humans and was a lunatic. A staff member at the shelter told me that he was now classed as unhomeable and that it was likely he'd be put to sleep. Being a sucker for a sob story and a lover of black labrador types I decided to try Bram out, despite having no plans to take on a third dog. For a few days I spent my free time walking him and seeing what his temperament was like, before turning up at home with him that August day.
To put it simply he turned our lives upside down. To start with he had a massive ear infection, was infested with fleas, had ringworm (which he spread to the other dogs) and constant diarrhoea. It took several months to get the ear infection and skin problems under control and a whole year and a lot of money to determine that the diarrhoea was caused by a chronic bacterial overgrowth. On the behaviour side we went to training classes but were less than successful being asked to leave two classes. Despite a lot of effort on my and Bram's part he just never seemed to understand what was required of him.
When we moved to the USA Bram of course came with us. Unfortunately the USA hasn't been as kind to Bram as it has with Bonnie and Shep. In the Autumn of 1997 he started scratching and chewing constantly, only stopping when his feet or ears bled. We tried antibiotics and then an antihistamine which proved to be disastrous. The drug we used was hydroxyzine and after the second tablet Bram had a seizure. We took him off it immediately and had him checked at the vets the next day. The view was that it was a result of the hydroxyzine and that now he was off it the seizures would stop.
By March 1998 the chewing hadn't resolved itself so we went to see a dermatologist. Skin tests revealed he had allergies to North Carolina grasses, house dust mites, tobacco pollen and cotton pollen. In England the house dust mite allergy wasn't enough to make him itchy - coming to North Carolina exposed him to the tobacco and cotton which pushed him over the edge. Our options were firstly to try keeping our house really clean (vacuumed every day) and have him sleep on cotton sheets. If that didn't work then we'd have to have him undergo desensitisation therapy. We started with the first option, just keeping the house clean but by July 1998 it was apparent that this wasn't working as the chewing had continued and, if anything got worse. We went back to the dermatologist and started him on a desensitisation vaccine which thankfully has worked very well for him. While he does still itch and chew a bit it's largely controlled by the vaccine.
In June 1998 it felt as though my world was ending - Bram suddenly started having seizures again ( so much for stopping the hydroxyzine stopping the seizures). He had 4 seizures in 3 days so was started on medication. He went 6 weeks before seizing again, the seizure unfortunately being another cluster with 4 occurring in half an hour. By Christmas things had deteriorated to the extent that we felt we needed to see a neurologist. In January 1999 Bram spent 2 days at NC State Veterinary School have all sorts of tests run. The results were pretty inconclusive the only positive find being that he has asymmetrical brain ventricles, due either to head trauma at an early age, or perhaps degenerative brain disease.
So where are we with Bram - well everyone who knows him falls in love with him so we must have something right. To give Bram his due he has come a long way and now I know the problems he has I am more innovative in ways of teaching him what we want him to do. Physically he is doing much better, his seizures decreasing in frequency the last one being on June 4th 2001! Having said this however, routine bloodwork in December 2002 showed a low thyroid level, a full thyroid panel proving that he was hypothyroid (apparently over 70% of dogs with epilepsy are also hypothyroid). He is now on thyroid supplementation and is doing great.
November 2004 - Bram has continued to exceed everyone's expectations. He's managing almost two years between seizures, his allergies are under control and his attitude still like that of a puppy.
For further information on our fight against epilepsy and to see Bram's diary click here
To see photographs of Bram click here
Each year millions of unwanted pets are destroyed. Please help reduce this number by spaying / neutering - all my dogs are .
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