A dog owner urges others to recognize the warning signs of an allergic reaction after her 6-year-old dog, Bear, went from being in good health to fighting for his life in a matter of minutes.
@thedogstaff, a content creator whose account features videos of her three doodles adopted from a shelter, recounts a terrifying ordeal that began with what she thought was an injured paw.
“The scariest thing happened to my dog yesterday,” she says. “I thought Bear had just come home and hurt her paw. Within minutes, I was rushing her to the emergency room.”
The caption accompanying her video reads: “A heads-up for dog owners: I thought my dog was fine… [We] ended up in the emergency room, in intensive care, where she was fighting for her life.” Her video has been viewed more than 14,000 times.
The content creator explains that Bear was acting normally. At lunchtime, she let her three dogs out into the yard while she ate a salad outside. She tells her audience that they weren’t out there for more than 10 minutes.
When she called them back inside, Bear was nowhere to be found. Eventually, the dog came out of the living room, where @thedogstaff says she found “her stomach full of vomit and diarrhea all over the carpet.”
At first, she thought it was one of her other dogs, who often eats grass and vomits it up. But then she saw Bear collapse on the floor.
“She’s completely lethargic. She’s panting [and] wheezing. I can tell something is really wrong,” explains @thedogstaff.
The woman says she hurriedly cleaned up the mess before rushing Bear to the Red Bank Veterinary Hospital, located about 30 minutes away.
Bear’s Condition Worsens
At the emergency hospital, the veterinarians found that Bear’s blood pressure was very low and her pulse was weak. The doctors also detected abnormalities in her mucous membranes and concerning blood test results. They administered IV fluids and Benadryl. They indicated that Bear would need to remain hospitalized until her blood pressure stabilized.
The woman and her husband returned home, but they soon received an alarming phone call: “His blood pressure had responded positively to the IV fluids, but then it plummeted even lower than before.”
“I started crying. My husband is so upset,” says @thedogstaff, adding that the situation was particularly difficult because of her husband’s aggressive cancer. “She’s his little sweetheart,” she says, referring to Bear. “This week was already nerve-wracking.”
The veterinarians warned that the next few hours would be critical. They administered epinephrine to counter what they diagnosed as a severe allergic reaction. Bear responded well to the medication, but the family was warned that the symptoms could return.
“They think she had an anaphylactic reaction,” the woman explains. “They think she must have been exposed to something at some point early in her life, and her immune system simply started overreacting.”
What caused Bear’s allergic reaction?
The most concerning part of this story is that the exact cause remains a mystery.
@thedogstaff explains that she noticed Bear was holding one of her paws up, which suggests she may have been bitten or stung by something outside. But the dog didn’t react to pressure when the vets examined her paw, leaving them with no obvious explanation.
The family searched the yard in hopes of finding the cause of Bear’s severe reaction. The woman says they found a few wasps, but they weren’t sure if their dog had come across one.
“She wanders through the bushes. She’s a dog, after all,” the woman explains. She adds that the vets told the family it could have been caused by anything and that it might happen again. Or, she adds, “it might never happen again.”
Did Bear survive?
Fortunately, Bear’s condition began to improve later that evening, and the family was able to bring her home the next day. She was discharged from the hospital with medication, including prednisone and Benadryl.
Today, @thedogstaff hopes that by sharing her experience, she’ll help other dog owners recognize an anaphylactic reaction before it’s too late. “You have to act very quickly,” she explains. “I think it’s our duty, as human beings, to share these stories so that we might help save another dog.”
What are the warning signs of anaphylaxis in dogs?
One of the striking aspects of Bear’s ordeal is how easily his initial symptoms could have been mistaken for simple indigestion.
According to PetMD, anaphylaxis affects the lungs and airways in most species, but in dogs, “the digestive tract often releases histamine directly into the liver,” causing severe vomiting and diarrhea that “can occur suddenly and seem to come out of nowhere.”
Other warning signs include lethargy, facial swelling, itching, and hives.
PetMD notes that “most reactions in dogs are caused by insect stings or bites (usually from bees, wasps, and venomous ants), medications, antigens in vaccines, or chemicals.”
Dogs are particularly prone to insect stings on their paws, muzzles, and faces due to the way they interact with their environment.
VCA Animal Hospitals emphasizes that these stings can cause allergic reactions “ranging from mild irritation to life-threatening anaphylaxis.”
Veterinary Partner, an online community of veterinarians created by veterinarians, explains that it is not uncommon to be unsure of what caused a severe allergic reaction in a dog.
It strongly recommends that pet owners not waste time trying to figure out what happened and instead take their pet to an emergency veterinarian immediately.
It also emphasizes that “in many cases, the first time an animal is exposed to an allergen capable of causing anaphylaxis, it does not show any obvious reaction,” but that upon the second exposure and every time thereafter, there is a risk that “it will develop signs of anaphylaxis that could be life-threatening,” because “unlike humans, pets generally do not eventually stop reacting to allergens.”
@thedogstaff
Subplot News contacted @thedogstaff via a private message on TikTok.
The article “She Thought Her Dog Bear Had Simply Injured His Paw. Then He Went Into Anaphylactic Shock” was first published on Subplot News.
She thought her dog, Bear, had simply hurt his paw. Then she went into anaphylactic shock.
This content was created with the help of AI.
