This is kind of a long story, but the entire thing is relevant.
I have a 9 year old f/s chocolate lab mix. She’s a shelter dog and has always had a bit of separation anxiety and general-every-day anxiety. She was the kind of dog who was always vocal somehow (whining, panting, whine-panting, grunting, etc), whether she was in her crate or when you came home.
She is crate trained (even if she occasionally barks while I’m gone) because she will be destructive if I leave her free roaming while I’m gone.
I’ve had her for 8 years. I know what her normal is.
Anyway, we lost another dog at the end of September (we had him for 5 years) to DCM. It was sudden and traumatic for everyone.
It was like a switch flipped and my anxious dog got even worse. She began barking while I was at work 100% of the time instead of just occasionally. She’d whine and vocalize a lot and became very clingy. I had always used trazodone as needed for camping trips or if we were going over to someone’s house, just to chill her out. I began using it more and more after my other dog died and figured ‘well, since I’m giving this every day, why not get her a medication that’s meant to be given daily?’ So I decided to try fluoxetine (Prozac) for her. I work in the vet field so I’m no stranger to different medications and their effects. I just hated seeing her so high strung and miserable all the time and wanted her to be more comfortable.
So around end of November, I started her on fluoxetine. I knew it was a medication that took around 4-6 weeks to see the effects of. It’s not an overnight fix.
After around 2 weeks I started to notice a change in her. She was stumbling around and twitching a lot. She had a mild cataract in her left eye that suddenly got much much worse in such a short amount of time; she was running into walls and couldn’t see me as well. She began acting so confused like she wasn’t even the same dog. It made her anxiety even worse if that was ever possible.
So I made the decision to wean her off of it, since of course you can’t just stop it cold turkey. She’s finally off of it after about two months of being on it and she’s permanently changed. She’s about 90% blind now and can’t see anything unless she’s in very bright sunlight. She still stumbles around and is constantly falling into her water bowl. She stands in corners and aimlessly paces around in circles. If she’s standing still, she twitches her head and neck. She has fecal incontinence.
I’m convinced fluoxetine ruined her and aged her 10 years in 2 months. I can hardly remember how she used to be. Now I have to block off rooms so she doesn’t get stuck in them and stumble around and hit her head on the walls. I have to guide or carry her outside/inside. She has accidents in the house now.
I’m so…. sad and angry. I’m convinced that if I hadn’t put her on fluoxetine, she wouldn’t be this bad. I haven’t seen any other stories like mine so I have no idea if it’s actually the fluoxetine that caused it or not, but it sure as hell looks that way.
I have a 9 year old f/s chocolate lab mix. She’s a shelter dog and has always had a bit of separation anxiety and general-every-day anxiety. She was the kind of dog who was always vocal somehow (whining, panting, whine-panting, grunting, etc), whether she was in her crate or when you came home.
She is crate trained (even if she occasionally barks while I’m gone) because she will be destructive if I leave her free roaming while I’m gone.
I’ve had her for 8 years. I know what her normal is.
Anyway, we lost another dog at the end of September (we had him for 5 years) to DCM. It was sudden and traumatic for everyone.
It was like a switch flipped and my anxious dog got even worse. She began barking while I was at work 100% of the time instead of just occasionally. She’d whine and vocalize a lot and became very clingy. I had always used trazodone as needed for camping trips or if we were going over to someone’s house, just to chill her out. I began using it more and more after my other dog died and figured ‘well, since I’m giving this every day, why not get her a medication that’s meant to be given daily?’ So I decided to try fluoxetine (Prozac) for her. I work in the vet field so I’m no stranger to different medications and their effects. I just hated seeing her so high strung and miserable all the time and wanted her to be more comfortable.
So around end of November, I started her on fluoxetine. I knew it was a medication that took around 4-6 weeks to see the effects of. It’s not an overnight fix.
After around 2 weeks I started to notice a change in her. She was stumbling around and twitching a lot. She had a mild cataract in her left eye that suddenly got much much worse in such a short amount of time; she was running into walls and couldn’t see me as well. She began acting so confused like she wasn’t even the same dog. It made her anxiety even worse if that was ever possible.
So I made the decision to wean her off of it, since of course you can’t just stop it cold turkey. She’s finally off of it after about two months of being on it and she’s permanently changed. She’s about 90% blind now and can’t see anything unless she’s in very bright sunlight. She still stumbles around and is constantly falling into her water bowl. She stands in corners and aimlessly paces around in circles. If she’s standing still, she twitches her head and neck. She has fecal incontinence.
I’m convinced fluoxetine ruined her and aged her 10 years in 2 months. I can hardly remember how she used to be. Now I have to block off rooms so she doesn’t get stuck in them and stumble around and hit her head on the walls. I have to guide or carry her outside/inside. She has accidents in the house now.
I’m so…. sad and angry. I’m convinced that if I hadn’t put her on fluoxetine, she wouldn’t be this bad. I haven’t seen any other stories like mine so I have no idea if it’s actually the fluoxetine that caused it or not, but it sure as hell looks that way.