One tough little Lady

[Eavlynn]

Hello all! I'd like to introduce you to a darling little dragon that has come to our rescue. Lady (presumably she, I won't know for sure until she puts on some size) was found abandoned in an apartment: no food, heat or UVB. A young woman took her in, but little Lady's MBD was more than she felt comfortable dealing with by herself. We met up this morning, and I brought Lady home to the rescue where we can work on her rehabilitation and recovery.

She has moderate to severe MBD, leaning more towards the severe end of the spectrum. She's very underweight, and has little use of her back legs. She also has what appears to be an abscess at the base of her tail on her dorsal side. With the risk of infection, she'll be going to see the vet here shortly to discuss her condition and a method of treatment.

Despite all she's been through she's full of spunk and energy, and has a fighting chance at a good recovery and a long life, thanks to the young woman who took her in.

She's eaten a few roaches, and eagerly took liquid calcium and water from a dropper. She also gave me a present on the way home, one nice solid poop Therefore no impaction issues and no indication of parasites. She's full of surprises.

Of course, no introduction is complete without photos!

Lady's home is a 40 gallon. Blacked out for security, with few items to climb on to prevent injuries from falls. An elevated but adjustable lamp allows me to tweak her temps at the twist of a knob. I also hung her UVB inside the enclosure, for max exposure, and the fixture is also adjustable. Now we have to work on food and calcium intake, as well as soaks for her abscess. I'll be alternating between betadine soaks and apple cider vinegar soaks, as well as using antibiotic ointment until her vet visit. Both betadine and ACV are antimicrobial, but ACV also helps to fight against fungal infections. I figure I'll hit it from all angles until we can get some concrete information from the vet.

Thanks for looking! I'll be keeping this thread up to date with Lady's progress!

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[Hdrydr31]

Awe I'm glad you were able to meet up with her and take her in.. She's in good hands with ya, keeping her in my thoughts and please keep us posted.

 

[Gayle Dace]

Thanks for being an angel to her, Eavlynn!

 

[Eavlynn]

I've started Lady on slurries as of this morning. I didn't have any organic baby food on hand so I made my own base of organic zucchini and organic apple mixed with Pedialyte, then tossed in some greens, wax worms, roaches, calcium powder, multivitamin powder, bee pollen, and probiotic. It was a success! She actually seemed to enjoy my nutrient concoction she even managed to stay clean throughout the process, which is nothing short of a miracle. We may stick to slurries for a little bit. Her bones are weak and she seems to have trouble chewing her roaches.

She's scooting around pretty well and has a good deal of energy. So much that she puffs and hisses at me every time I get near her. I figure she'll calm down after a week or two when she realizes I'm not a big scary monster. I love her spunk though!

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[RaeAnn]

You Eavlynn are amazing!! This sweet baby couldn't have found a better person to love and care for her.

From the sounds of it she definitely is a tough little lady for sure. The diluted vinegar soaks is a genius idea, the stuff can truly work miracles. It's how I give my pups flea baths

Keep us updated, I look forward to hearing about her progression


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[Eavlynn]

I thought I should update Lady's post. As discussed in my other post "Impaction tips and tricks" Lady is impacted, but making good progress, which is great! She's also almost completely stopped "gulping", which tells me the calcium I've been giving is doing its job to slow and hopefully halt the progression of her MBD.

I'm anxiously awaiting her vet visit so that we can discuss the small wound near her tail, and get some x-rays. Her lower back is deformed, and I'm hoping it's from the MBD and not build up from the potential infection of the wound, which appears to be healing. I hope to get a low dose laxative to help break up the impaction to make it easier to for her to void. She's making progress, and I feel positive about her prognosis!

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[CrazyLeopardGeckoLady]

I'm glad she's doing well!! You're doing such a great thing [emoji5]
If you want to help her poop but with a more natural way you can give her a tiny bit of olive oil


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[Eavlynn]

I mixed a drop of organic extra virgin olive oil in with the prune baby food. I give her a little bit each day, and so far, she's giving me a little waste in return. Not a pleasant trade off, but it seems to be working

I can only imagine how terrible she feels, and she's so tiny and easily frightened. I can't wait until we get past this.

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[Hdrydr31]

As long as it is coming out that's a good thing, once clear it will be way better.. just keep up the good work and keep giving her nutrient packed slurries and in no time she will make a come back.

 

[PatsyB]

A last case option would also be to use a few very small drops of mineral oil. You can drip it on her nose and have her lick it off. I would do the slurries for awhile. One thing that I did recently read, if you have a very thin dragon whose immune system is compromised, you want to hold off on adding protein to the slurries. The body uses more energy to process protein so it's something that you slowly want to add to their diet because you don't want to hurt their kidneys. Something like critical care would be a good option. Your slurry concoction is PERFECT. I love seeing people make their own sort of baby food rather than buying it. It's more healthy and you know what is being put in it.

One thing that may be a problem for her later in life is the fact that the base of the tail is positioned down like it is. As she grows and her tail gets fatter and stronger, it might cause an issue for her when she is trying to go to the bathroom. But see what the vet says.

Also ask the vet what they think of the ACV soaks. I would think that it would be too acidic for them but I really don't know with this one.

 

[Eavlynn]

Lady's vet appointment went as well as expected. Her bones are essentially rubber, which is bad in general, but good for helping to correct the spinal and tail deformity. She's got an oral pain medication with very low dose Valium added to help relax the muscles and stop the spasms, so that I can work on physical therapy to help straighten her spine and tail. (PatsyB: I'm hoping this will help to negate the potential future issues you pointed out.) If her deformity can be straightened out, even just a little bit, it should help to reduce the level of pain she experiences long term.

I was also sent home with a critical care formula to replace her slurries. It's supposed to be more nutritionally complete than anything I could make myself (I think my slurries were great, but what do I know?). I'm also to provide water via eye dropper to help with hydration, which should in turn help with the impaction. The vet was able to work some of it out, but there's still a good bit left in her system. It's not even a hard impaction, but a build up of waste material that she lacks the muscle strength and control to excrete by herself.

I was told to cease treatment for the wound. It's healing well, and proper heat and lighting will do more to heal her wound than soaking or ointment will. Skeptical though I may be, I'll listen and cease topical treatment for the wound.

He feels good about her future prognosis. It's going to be a very slow, very long road to recovery, but we'll get there. It will take as long as it takes!

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[PatsyB]

I thought your slurries sounded great too! Critical Care is good though, should really help things.

 

[Eavlynn]

Lady loved it! So did one of my geckos that usually throws a fit. They were such good sports about it that it blew my mind.

She also drank two full eye droppers of water, which is a lot for her tiny self, so that should help get things moving and hopefully sort out this impaction.

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[Hdrydr31]

I guess all in all it was expected so hopefully with proper husbandry and vet care she can mend some issues making her life better and easier.. poor gal.

 

[Eavlynn]

She's doing really well with the exercises. The pain meds with the muscle relaxer are probably helping her a lot. She's been taking her critical care formula and drinking water like a champ. No progress on the impaction yet. I'll have to give her another warm soak and belly massage today.

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[RaeAnn]

How is little lady doing? Any progress on the impaction?


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[Eavlynn]

Ugh no! I just told Zaiden that I can get the mass down to her vent, but it's so large that she can't pass it. It curves her back under and pulls her tail tightly to the right. I have her scheduled to see the vet for an enema on the 29th when I take Ruth in for her surgery. I wanted laxatives to help soften it up, but for some reason he wouldn't do it. I'm going to be a bit more demanding this time.

Her MBD seems to have pretty much stopped progressing, which is great. And the wound on her tail is just a scar now. So, we've made some progress, just not with the impaction which has been giving me grey hair.

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[RaeAnn]

It's great that you've managed to stop the MBD from progressing and her wound is healed. At least that takes some worry off of you so that you can focus on the impaction.

Apparently her digestive tract is doing its part by moving the impaction down to be eliminated which is good news. It sounds as if either her muscles may be a little weak in her rectum or anus due to all she has been through, or the impaction may be too large for her to expel the mass. I think the enema is a good move at this point. Poor little lady :/

Will Ruth be getting fixed the same day?


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[Eavlynn]

It's great that you've managed to stop the MBD from progressing and her wound is healed. At least that takes some worry off of you so that you can focus on the impaction.

Apparently her digestive tract is doing its part by moving the impaction down to be eliminated which is good news. It sounds as if either her muscles may be a little weak in her rectum or anus due to all she has been through, or the impaction may be too large for her to expel the mass. I think the enema is a good move at this point. Poor little lady :/

Will Ruth be getting fixed the same day?


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Ruth will be going for her surgery on the 29th when I take Lady back in. We're going to run blood work and look at the risk of complications. If there's more than a 10% chance of complications, I probably won't do it.

As for little Lady, we got some more of the impaction out in the bath. It was so hard that it reminded me of porcelain! It's no wonder she's having such a difficult time. If the enema doesn't help, I'll be demanding a laxative to help soften if up so that it can be passed. If she was bigger and stronger, I'd inquire about surgery since it's so large, but it's too risky, given her size and condition. The vet doesn't want to give me much to help her work it out, and last time I just went along with what he recommended. Next time I'm going to push for what I think she needs. I believe that a mother's intuition is stronger than any vets opinion, you and Maddie proved that to be true.

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[RaeAnn]

Poor baby :/ I would absolutely want something to help soften things up. I can't understand why any Dr would disagree with that at this point. Hopefully they are on the same page as you this time. The warm soaks sound like they are helping her little muscles to relax, that probably provides a lot of relief for her.

Ive learned that Drs, while most mean well, do not always hold all of the answers. Therefore we have to trust our own instincts sometimes when it comes to our babies.


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