Dog stopped eating

[Mandalong22]

Nati has been on a great track. Gained 11lbs since her diagnoses in Mayish. She didn’t start gaining and stabilizing until July. We started her in B12 shots 3 weeks ago. One a week for 6 weeks. She has been doing really well but Thursday she stopped eating. I keep having to throw food away. She has had one cup of food in 3 days. She has been pooping but last night she strained and nothing came out. She had a very small poop this morning. Normal and good poop just small. Could the B12 be working and now I am giving too many enzymes?

[jilbert57]

Good morning. If your dog is at ideal weight I would suggest trying less food. Enzymes are dosed by the amount of food given at each meal. Usually 1 level teaspoon enzyme per 1 cup kibble.
Your dog may just not need as much food. Maybe try a few smaller meals for a day or 2 and present it when she seems interested.
Try 1/2 cup food to 1/2 teaspoon enzyme mixed and incubated.
Just a thought.

Jill

[Jean]

is there any rumbling from the belly ?

[Mandalong22]

No rumbling belly. Yesterday I tried a cup a food at a time. She only ate 1 cup and it took hours. The 2nd cup of food I had to throw out this morning. She does 1/2 teaspoon of 8x of the enzyme Diane per cup of food.

[jilbert57]

Sorry, didn't know you were using 8x enzyme. I would go down to 1/2 cup food and 1/4 teaspoon enzyme. See if that helps. Maybe a tad tuna water or oil on it?

[Jean]

what has been the appetite up to this will she feed from your hand

[Tuckaboo Pam]

Hey, Amanda---I just wanted to say that, of my five dogs, two are notorious for taking a break from eating. Sometimes I think they are going through some sort of metabolic cycle, but other times it seems they are just tired of their food. My vet told me to buy a tube of "Fresh Pet" (I'm not sure that's the name. It's refrigerated at Publix), and sprinkle some on top of their kibble. It seems to get their juices flowing, and they will eat, but other times I slowly change their kibble, and that helps, too. Neither of them is my EPI dog, though. ---Pam & Tucker

[Mandalong22]

She will eat from my hand. I give her dried apples and she will eat those. My parents are visiting so it could be partly because of that too. With her EPI she has been so hungry and we went down from 12 cups of food to 6 so her not eating is strange to me. I am going to talk to the vet tomorrow when I get her b12 shot about reducing the enzymes. I just don’t want to change too many things at once

[Olesia711]

Very good idea not to change many things at once. THe rule of thumb is to make only 1 change at a time.

Might want to have the vet check her out.. just to make sure something else, like some sort of infection or something is not what the problem is.....sometimes they pick up a bug that is not EPI related, sometimes it can be a UTI that makes them not want to eat....

Also... with the 8x... your enzyme to food ratio, like Jill said, is MUCH different. Try a ratio of 1/2 tsp of 8x enzymes with 1 cup of food...

Also.... maybe until she is checked out by the vet (if you decide to do this) , just give her 1/2 cup of food with 1/4 tsp of 8x enzymes... and don't give any more until the next meal.... sometimes a greatly reduced amount of food just for a little while helps get them back on track.

[Olesia711]

while i am thinking about... if she doesn't want to eat another non-EPI related issue could be something going on with the kidneys.... not that i am saying this is what is going on, but it might be something for your vet to check... if nothing else, to rule this out. The reason why i am mentioning this is because we have had a good handful of cases here where the dog stopped eating, and of course we first suspected SID, but then when nothing worked on the SID that typically does, when the vet checked out the inappetence, it turned out to be a kidney issue..... so IMHO best to be safe than sorry.