An Update From Nix

 I’ve given Fripp the day off today (or rather he’s decided to take it off!) I  think he did find the trip to the vets quite tiring yesterday and this will give me a good opportunity to fill you all in on where we are exactly with Fripp and his kidneys.

Sadly, his blood results are not brilliant, but then they’ve been getting worse over the last year or so. This is to be expected of course with chronic kidney disease but now that it’s finally happening it still comes as a shock. Bron his vet remains very positive but I can see that he is tiring more quickly. She is hopeful that possibly his ‘double’ flush yesterday might help things and we’ll retest his blood in a week or so.

He still enjoys his walks, three or four a day but they are a lot shorter than they were. When he’s at home, he’s asleep for pretty much most of the time. He becomes restless late evening and wants to go in the garden to stargaze so I let him do that in fact, I let him do exactly what he wants at the moment, even if it’s probably not that good for him, I just want him to be happy.

I’m fairly certain that he’s not in any pain though I think that sometimes he probably doesn’t feel brilliant, but as I say, he seems happy and his tail is wagging but he is getting tired and he has lost some weight.

This is a hard blog to write today, but I wanted to prepare you because I know you all love Fripp as much as I do. Fripp will continue to be upbeat on his blog and hopefully funny too and I will post myself on the medical updates as and when they happen.

 For those of you who love blood test results as I do, the important ones are Creatinine and Urea. I will post the figures for the last year or so. A healthy dog would be somewhere in between the figures in the brackets.

13 Oct 23  Creatinine 108 (44-133)   Urea 9 ( 3-10)

25 May 24                   165                         12

10 Sept 24                   217                         21

10 Jan 25                     295                         46

It goes without saying that we have done everything possible to keep Fripp healthy. He was diagnosed with chronic kidney disease when he was 7 and one vet gave him a two to three year prognosis (not Bron) He went into kidney failure when he was 8 and it was discovered one of his ureters was blocked. There was a stone at each end and one shunting up and down and unfortunately not the type of stone that responds to diet. An attempt was made to place a stent but that didn’t work due to the stones so he now has a subcutaneous bypass to carry the urine from the kidney to the bladder. This comes with its own problems of course being a foreign body. 

I’ll keep you informed but please know that Fripp is getting the best veterinary care possible and I know that without Bron his vet he probably wouldn’t be here now. 

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