Snoops' road to recovery

[rainey]

My chin Snoops is still on the road to recovery from his near-death experience with heat stroke. I'm glad to say though that he's somewhat back to his old self. The only issue is that I guess he may have had some neurological damage, as he has trouble balancing, wobbles to the left the majority of the time, and cannot jump. Occasionally he can hop onto something at a low level, but he'll usually fall onto his (bad) side if he tries to jump or run to fast. Also once or twice I saw him practically running in place/backwards, I don't know what that was. He is finally eating and drinking avidly, however, so I'm not sure if this is a permanent thing, or if he's still healing.

The last time I took him to the vet, he was still being handfed, and I was told that he "most likely had brain damage," so I need to get a second opinion from someone that does a true examination (it wasn't a chin doctor).

Anyway, apart from the wobbling Snoops seems to be doing pretty well. He's back to responding to his name, and still has all his old habits...so it makes me wonder if he has brain damage. Could the stroke have just affected his control over his motor skills/hind legs? Any advice/knowledge from someone who knows more about this than I do would be much appreciated, thanks!

 

[rainey]

Also I forgot to mention, he refuses to drink water from a water bottle, (my guess because it looks like a syringe and he truly DESPISED being handfed), so I have to leave out a bowl of water for him and clean it every day. I see him drink from the bowl frequently. Due to his wobbliness, however, it's a little dangerous because he has a tendency to run into it/get wet. Any advice on how to resolve this issue, too? Sorry for so many questions

 

[ticklechin]

When Vincent had a stroke-it was not from heat but a blood vessel burst confirmed by necropsy, he had his good days and bad days, the vet could not tell me the long term outcome because no one knows, just like human stroke victims. Just go day by day and love him. Vincent had partially paralyzed throat muscles so feeding was a bear and he choked if fed too fast or much, you may have some kind of issue there also with the drinking.

 

[rainey]

Thanks for this post, sorry to hear about Vincent. Snoops still remains stable, he's full of life so I suppose he just has a bit of a disability now. He lives in a large one level cage by himself and continues to drink from a bowl! I keep a close eye on him. He loves his hay and Mazuri, but he doesn't seem to chew on much of anything anymore. I'll have to get his teeth checked out to make sure he doesn't have a problem there.
I'll upload a video of him soon---I'm worried he is having mini seizures, and am not too sure what to do about it. He will fall on his side and start curling up in spastic, rigid motions? It only seems to occur after he has been startled or is overdoing it in the dust bath.