Isabella's overshot and base narrow teeth

In May of the year 2000, I purchased the dog of my dreams. For nearly forty years I had wanted a Standard Poodle but the time was never right. Finally it was.

I did research and found what I thought would be the best breeder. This puppy was sired by the top Poodle  who was also one of the top dogs of all breeds at the time. Her mother was a group winner and the royalty behind her was impressive.

I named her Isabella. Her full name being Penhurst Queen of Spain. She was a pistol and I adored her!

Soon after she arrived home, it became evident something was wrong with her. She would often regurgitated after eating. Her stools were normal, just very yellow.

I took her to many different vets (8 or 9 I think!) over the years but none had an answer for her. We had switched her to raw food  early on in hopes that would help. We found that she could  barely tolerate turkey but that was about it. Whenever she got any kind of grains at all or other meat, she became violently ill and would moan and groan all night long. I often stayed up with her and rubbed her tummy. It was horrible. The only thing that offered any relief was Gas-X with Maalox (she liked the cherry flavor). Some mornings the same food from the night before was still in her stomach, totally undigested.

Four years ago, I mentioned her problem to Dr. John McDougall (a human Board Certified Internist) (www.drmcdougall.com ) . He suggested I put her on a vegan diet. Even though my husband Mel & I are strict vegans and have been for years, I laughed at him. I was convinced that dogs were supposed to eat meat and that could not possibly be her problem.

I took her to more vets. She was scoped and  her tummy biopsied. They said she had helicobacter and treated her for that. It helped for a while but she soon resumed her spewing and discomfort.

This dog also has seizures! What an unhealthy mess she was. So much for being bred from royalty!

Finally, when she was four and a half (about a year after her canines were fixed), we took her to a Board Certified Veterinarian Internist who scoped her and went into her small intestine (which the other vet had not done). She took a biopsy from there. The lab results said severe Inflammatory Bowel Disease (IBD) probably caused by an auto-immune disease and most likely brought on by a food allergy. We had tested her twice for food allergies and it was always negative. We had never suspected IBD because she never had a loose stool let alone diarrhea. The vet wanted to put her on high doses of steroids and other immune suppressants. When she told me the possible side effects, I said NO WAY! They told me if I didn't treat her aggressively like that she could die. She was 23" tall and weighed only 37 pounds. She was unable to absorb any nutrients from her food (what she was able to keep down anyway).

I remembered what Dr. McDougall had suggested four years earlier and went to his website to read about IBD and from his lectures and tapes that the cause was animal protein. I took her off the Pepsid AC she was on and switched her to a vegan dog food called Natural Life.
http://www.nlpp.com/products.html?topic=vegetarian

It was low in fat and has high quality ingredients. It took only one day to see a difference! By the third day, I had a different dog!!! Before, we had to make her lie perfectly still after eating or she got sick. Now she can play and run around and everything stays where it is supposed to! It seems like a miracle, yet the answer was there all along!
We also have tried other vegetarian dog foods but have not had the same success as with Natural Life. One other food that is also vegan and higher in protein is called Evolution. You can find it here:
http://sites.managerslogin.com/folder24/index.cfm?id=195532&fuseaction=browse&pageid=36
She seems to do OK with that food as well.

Thank you Dr. McDougall! Thank you for all that you do for people and now for dogs too! I am going to shout this from the roof tops. I hope others will listen but I wouldn't and I AM a vegan!
In the fall of 2005 we took all of our Poodles to a veterinarian ophthalmologist to have their eyes checked. She diagnosed Isabella as having juvenile cataracts. This is another hereditary condition that can eventually cause the dog to go blind!

On April 2, 2006, Isabella bloated and torsioned. This condition is also called GDV or Gastric Dilation (bloat) with Volvulus (torsion). This genetic condition is extremely serious and many dogs who develop this condition die. Click here to read more about this killer disease. We noticed her feeling uncomfortable shortly after she ate. She didn't exhibit the classic signs of GDV for another 5 hours! We took her to the VDA emergency veterinary hospital in San Diego where they passed a tube into her stomach to release the air. Her stomach was also twisted or torsioned which can cause the dog to go into shock and die. They performed a gastropexy on her to tack her stomach to her abdominal wall so it won't be able to twist again. She will still be able to bloat but we will have more time to get her to the vet to release the air if needed.

While doing the gastropexy surgery on Isabella, the veterinarian looked at her other organs to check for damage. She said there didn't seem to be any damage from the GDV, however, Isabella's liver and adrenal glands are very small. She said to watch her for Addison's disease. We often check Isabella for Addison's disease because she has littermates with this horrible inherited condition!

It would be great if more breeders would report health problems so others could take appropriate action to prevent and/or avoid health tragedies.