Why is my dog puking?

In My Humble Opinion
1

Yes, she’s been to the vet. No, the vet isn’t seriously concerned, just told us to keep an eye on her. I’m mostly just curious as to what could be causing this.

Background: She’s a 9-year-old pug, in decent-ish health, not overweight or anything like that. She did have a pretty scary episode back in Feb/March, starting out with Megaesophagus that was eventually found to be caused by Myasthenia Gravis. She almost died of aspiration pneumonia, but we very luckily got her through it, and from all indications now, the MG has gone away (it does that in dogs) and all is well.

Except… she’s puking. Not often, but every week or so, we’ll give her breakfast (canned Wellness, which is the vet’s recommendation after the MG) and she immediately throws it up. I don’t think it’s regurgitation (which is very common with megaesophagus) - I saw her throw up this morning, and she was having belly spasms. Hard to tell, though, since I’m not an expert.

It tends to happen within a few minutes of her eating. Typically we give her little or no food for the rest of the day, and she’s right as rain the next day. Hell, she’s right as rain 15 minutes after she pukes. And she’s fine for a week or so, and then… more pukage.

It’s been going on for maybe 2 months. And, like I said, the vet knows and is not overly worried, though she is befuddled as to what could be causing it.

I’ve wondered if it’s the food, but she eats the same food (albeit different flavors) every day. It happens with all the flavors, too. I thought at first maybe it was one particular flavor, but it doesn’t seem to be. I don’t really want to experiment with different food, as it took a bit to find this one that she did so well with after the megaesophagus/MG, and vet doesn’t really want to change it, either.

Any ideas? Anything else I should talk to the vet about? Other than this, she seems to be in really good health, looks good, has a lot of energy, and is generally a good little puggy.

2

Try less food twice a day.

3

Heh. She was on twice a day feedings, when we talked to vet, she said to do 3x day feedings & less food. She still pukes.

4

Did she drink some hydrogen peroxide?

5

Hell, my cats do that all the time. In their case it’s caused by them inhaling the food (not literally). Maybe these are just times when she’s especially hungry and just eats too fast? Try giving her a very little amount staggered out over an hour. If that’s not horribly inconvenient, which it kinda is. But if it works, then you might have your answer.

6

Turn off the radio/TV that she can hear. She is tired of the “Royal Baby” shit.

7

She might be gulping too fast and inhaling air along with the food. What if you add a little water and make it soupier, so she has to lap it up?

She is drinking ok, right?

Other than that, I might suggest a second opinion.

8

I have to add that dog food can be contaminated. Always check on it. Recall

I see there is a dog food brand called BARF. What the hell were they thinking?

9

No recall notices on the dog food.

I tend to think that maybe she is gulping it down a little too fast. Or something. I restricted her food through the end of the day yesterday and this morning gave her the normal amount, and she’s fine.

I think she does it to confound me. I caught her giggling at me several times yesterday.

10

My cat went through a similar thing and then the vomiting became more and more frequent. She was like clockwork and we knew she would have an episode every third day or so. She also had loose stools and some other symptoms. She was eventually diagnosed with IBD and put on massive doses of pred. We were feeding her a limited ingredient diet to begin with, now she is on the allergen free stuff and is doing very well.

11

If the puking seems to be correlated with gulping her food too fast, you can also try putting a ball or a large (much too large to fit in her mouth) stone in the bowl with her food. She’ll have to eat around the obstacle, which will slow her down a bit. You may need to add extra balls/stones if she gets good at eating around one.

You can also buy bowls like this and this that have built-in bumps and ridges that do the same thing.

12

That link there, to the “grass” bowl, is a really clever idea. I’m tempted to buy that for my own dog. Sancho’s a really picky eater but he likes grazing and browsing through the grass. I wonder if he’d enjoy using that.

13

Your dog wants to be aNavy fighter pilot?

14

The grass idea I’ve seen work for cats and the water/broth idea is brilliant.

Wait, is she in the room when you come to the SDMB? I suppose its possible that there’s too much snark in her diet. Still, whatever you do, don’t blow into her ears.